Eagles Over the Kennebec

The question is:  how much world building do you do before starting a new series or tangent? I'm working on my first novel and keep finding I have to backtrack to explain assumptions.

There are a couple of things going on in this question, so I'll deal with the easiest one first:  It's Perfectly OK to have to go back and fix/add stuff in/to your story.  We all do it.  We all get stuff wrong in the first draft.  That's why most of us (I have had conversations with writers who say they write perfectly and never redraft.  Perhaps they do.) do multiple, or rolling, drafts.

As to how much world building I/we do before starting a new series...my first inclination is to say, "None; the characters tell me what I need to know, when I need to know it."

While that's true, it's probably not true enough.  There are certain basic decisions you need to make before you start writing a story.

You should know what kind of story you're writing:  romance, science fiction, fantasy, mystery, literary, &c, &c.  Knowing your genre will narrow what kind of world you're allowed to play in.  Yes, there are crossovers.  The Liaden stories cross genres six ways from Thursday, but they are rooted in the traditions of science fiction.

Now, this business with the characters telling me/us what we need to know?  That's true.  But the reason it's true is that Steve and I tend to "meet" the characters who will be living in any particular story first. That's How We Do It.  Other writers think about the world/society first, and then they think about what kind of people would live in that world, and what kind of trouble they'd get into, what their assumptions are about their world, and if they're right, wrong, or yes.

One of my favorite stories about world building comes from Janet Kagan.  She'd determined to write Hellspark, a book about language, and how it shapes society, thought, and prejudice; about what sentience looks like.  She worked hard on the kinesics of the various characters and cultures, kinesics being a plot-point, and she worked hard on her main character, Tocohl, who was a master linguist able to get around in multiple cultures because of her mastery of language and body language.  She wanted, particularly, for none of the cultures depicted in Hellspark to be "ours."

And she was just about to hand the book in when she realized something.

In her book about alien kinesics?

The master linguist nodded.

Well, she tore the book apart to find and fix each of those incidences.  As one would, of course.

Now, that's not the story of a failure -- the error was caught in time.

But it is a cautionary tale to all of us, to think about what we're doing in the world and society we're building, and to question the easy answers that come from our assumptions and a lifetime of experience in what we like to call the real world.

Ask yourself:  What would a kid who lives in a closed environment where germs and dirt would cause a lot of problems, cuss by?  Might he use, mud, or dirt?  Supposing this closed environment that must be kept clean -- how is that done?  Who does it?  What's it called, the clean-up run?  It's a basic task, keeping the ship clean, a survival task -- is it therefore high-value?  Is the Garbage Man the ranking crewman, revered for keeping the ship spotless and the crew alive?  Or is Stinks a low-level task relegated to the junior-most?  It could go either way, right?  Just because we don't happen to revere sanitation workers in so-called real life doesn't mean that's Natural Order.

Once you've made your choice -- be consistent.  Pay attention.  Daydream about what your choices mean, down the story-road, what interesting developments might spring from them.

. . .but you can do most of that while you're writing, see?  So long as you remember that going back and "fixing" things is a natural part of the process of storytelling.

. . .hope that helps.

It snowed this morning; now, it's spitting ice pellets.  In view of the weather, I declined to go into town, hoping for better tomorrow.

For fun, I called the oil company to find out why we'd run out of oil.  I also solicited promises that this would never happen again, promises the young lady at the Office adroitly failed to give while being oh-so-helpful.  One result of her helpfulness and my continuing failure to understand how this unhappy circumstance could have come about, is that we will host yet! another! tech! tomorrow.  He will check the lines and the intake, the tank, and the furnace itself, to be sure that we don't have a slow leak somewhere, and to patch it if we do.

So, that.

I again called the Maine State Archivist, who was not in, though this time, I got to leave a message with a live person, rather than voice mail.  I received a promise that the Archivist would return my call this afternoon, but I have Doubts that this will actually happen.  Perhaps he'll prove me wrong.

I also called the guy who gave us a quote on putting a rooflet over the outside front stairs, and then disappeared off the face of the earth, to find out if he actually intended to do the work, and when.  That call went to voice-mail, which I supposed I could've predicted.

In between phone calls, and before we had finished off the coffee in the pot, a UPS truck pulled into the driveway, and the driver gave into Steve's hands two boxes of post cards -- one for Trade Secrets and one for Carousel Seas -- which we will be taking with us to PhilCon.  Many thanks to Laura at Baen, for putting this together for us.

The mail brought the yearly aggravation of Form 8802, wherein we pay the government a fee to certify that  that we are, indeed, US citizens, and therefore do not have to pay taxes on monies we earn overseas.  So, yanno, yay.

I should probably finish off my phone calling extravaganza with a call to the ACA, to see if I can get a supervisor, or somebody who has once in their life at least looked over the edge of the box, but I fear the force is not sufficiently strong in me.

Alliance of Equals stands at just a smidge shy of 31,000 words.  I have about 7,700 words (roughly two chapters) left from the words excised from Dragon in Exile, and I believe they go Right About Here, which will put me, again, roughly, at just about 40,000 words.  Which will be a good place to leave it while we go down-coast to party.  When we come home from PhilCon, I'll read those 40,000-ish words, and then move on with the next 60-90,000-ish all-new words.  This book is due on Madame the Editor's desk in February.  No, I don't know when it will be published, or when the eArc will be available, just to nip those both in the bud.

Several people have wanted to know how come Alliance is moving along "so quickly" while Dragon took so long to write.  There are two answers to that -- three answers, if you count the age-old, and very true, "all books write different" -- a simple answer and a complicated one.

The simple answer is:  Dragon is Exile took so long to write because I was trying writing two books at once.

The complicated answer also addresses the question raised by the simple answer ("But WHY were you trying to write two books at once?" so hang on to that one, 'k?  Thx.)

The reason we were trying to write two books at once is:

1.  We pitched five books, and the first book in the pitch had to do with the Dutiful Passage

2.  One of the other books had to do with Surebleak

3.  The Surebleak book wanted to be written first, but I (mostly, it was I) resisted this, insisting that the first book had to be written first.

(A side issue which still influenced the writing -- I was at the bottom of the Manic/Depressive Wheel.  Between us, I was in a hole under the wheel, which is just generally a very bad place to write from.  It's especially a bad place to start writing from, because the beginning of the book is where you set up all the stuff that's going to, yanno, happen in the story.  And the beginning of a series -- or of a five-book dash -- is where you set up the rest of the series.  That means it's really preferable to have good access to your brain.  And the big thing that depression does, besides making you feel bad, is?  Right.  Depression makes you stupid.  So, that.)

4.  By the time I realized that I had to write the Surebleak book first, or kill both it and the Passage book through Auctorial Stupidity, and untangled the plots from each other, the Surebleak book no longer trusted me.

5.  That meant that I needed to coax it, and sweet-talk it, and Calmly Accept whatever bits and pieces it gave me.  Then, after I had all the bits and pieces I was apparently going to get, I had to figure out the order of the scenes, and write all the connective tissue. And! Since the book no longer trusted me, I had to trust it.  Which among other things meant accepting the existence of a character whose purpose in the story was only Revealed as we were going through the penultimate draft.

5a.  Steve could not take over and Just Write the Book because, (1) I was being an idiot, and (2) the entangled plots were a mess the like of which you rarely see.  I hardly knew how to untangle them, and it was my mess.

5b. Tangential Interesting Factoid:  At one point early in our career, we did manage to write A Whole Wrong Book.  The solution to that was easy -- write the correct book.  In the five weeks, I think it was, to deadline.

6.  The good side of all this is that, when we came to address Book the Second, we had almost a quarter of a book already in the can.  Which is why Alliance seems to be moving along at such a spanking pace.

Today's blog title comes to you, again, courtesy of Steeleye Span:  Lady Isobel and the Elf Knight

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Progress on Alliance of Equals
30,874/100,000 OR 31% Complete

"He's a bit stiff in the honor, the third mate," he murmured.

So, in the month of August, I wrote two short stories.  Here are the opening lines of each:

The Gift of Music:
The ballroom and the concert halls paid best, but they wanted the Big Bands, and the big acts up from New York and Atlantic City.

The Wolf's Bride:
The dogs of the village knew him; and he passed without challenge from forest edge to market street, walking with a predator's sure, silent tread down the moss-lined way.

#

Yesterday, was an Official Day Off, in respect of my hands, which I had managed to offend.  I read Lord of Light for the first time in many years, and remain constant in my opinion that Creatures of Light and Darkness is, just barely, the superior novel.  Others may, of course, disagree.

Today, there is yoga, and grocery shopping, and various small chores, then the opening of the proposal file and the beginning of staring into the middle distance, contemplating Things Liaden.  I will probably also sign sheets of paper -- but not too many sheets of paper, hands; I promise.

So!  What're you doing today that's fun and interesting?

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*Ref here (possibly not safe for work, not for content, but for loudness of laughter)

Things are still somewhat in disarray here at the Cat Farm.  Scrabble and Mozart are still insisting that The Kid has to be here somewhere, darnit, and they occasionally mount exploratory surveys.

Mozart yesterday went over the entire house, using the MomCat call, but damn -- The Kid still didn't turn up.  He then sought Steve out to Explain This At Length, and (possibly) to Demand Assistance.  Steve was, sadly, not able to bring much to this, except to offer scribbles.

Scrabble, ever methodical, periodically checks Socks' favorite spots, and has three times now put his favorite toys into play, noisily -- but that didn't pull him out of his Silly Fluff sulks, either.  There are also Other Worrisome Developments, such as Socks' bowl going missing.  She has duly noted this on the inventory.

The humans are at loose ends, somewhat, and not so sprightly as they might be.  Work, however, goes on; things arrive in the mail; and laundry must be done.

Things that have arrived in the mail include three! guidebooks for Angkor Wat, which are fascinating.  (No, I'm not going to Angkor Wat or Siem Reap or Cambodia or Viet Nam.  No, I don't know why I had to have these books.  The backbrain at work, I suppose. I try not to question too closely in the belief that, eventually, All Will Become Clear.  It would be nice to occasionally get a memo, though.)  Anyhow -- fascinating, with pictures! and teensytinyitsybitsy little print, and it is to swoon.  So, yanno, at least the backbrain's happy.

Also in the mail -- today, in fact -- was a sympathy card from the vet's office, with personal notes from all the staff, aka Socks' Waterville Fan Club; and  Protector, the next Foreigner novel.

Speaking of guidebooks, I ought to get one for New York, so I can figure out how far things are from other things and how to move around the place.  Hmm.  Steve and I will be at Book Expo America (aka BEA) at the end of May, doing a book signing and some other stuff TBA.  In theory, we will have some unscheduled time to do, um, stuff.  Noting that the Sheer Amount of Stuff  in New York makes thinking about what one would like to do-or-see. . .somewhat overwhelming.

But!  What do I find, via the New Yorker, but that Kinky Boots, the Musical! is/will be at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre (located at 45th Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues, it says, here, helpfully, no doubt). This is very exciting, and visions of theater tickets dance in my brain (to be immediately dashed by my lack of knowing almost everything I need to know in order to figure out if a night at the theater is even possible.  That guidebook is looking like a better and better idea...)

#

Of possible interest to those who follow the ups and downs of the publishing biz, and wonder why writers go crazy, is the whole Night Shade Books Nightmare.  Steve and I are not involved with Night Shade, we have no skin in the game, but a lot of our friends and colleagues are involved in this. . .horrifying situation.

Here's a fairly temperate analysis, with history, written by a well-known SF/F agent.

Here's another summary of the situation, by Tobias Buckell.

Here's Phil Foglio's take (Night Shade publishes the Girl Genius text novels (NOT the graphic novels)

Here's the first i09 article regarding the situation.

And, here's Mr. Lassen of Night Shade, in his own words.

Kameron Hurley, one of Night Shade's authors, rings down the sky, and explains why she's considering the "deal."

Andy Zack, of the Zack Literary Agency, weighs in.

#

Progress on Carousel Seas

24,893/100,000 OR 24.89% Complete

"That's an impressive bit of work the man does," I said, slowly. "I wonder if it does any good, in the long run."

So, the other day I had occasion to count on behalf of a Sekrit Project. And my counting revealed to me — and I revealed to Steve — that we have thus far in our careers committed (rounding only slightly up) 323,000 words of Liaden Universe® short stories.  (This number includes the not-quite-yet-published “Skyblaze” and the author-written fanfic “King of the Cats,” but does not include “Intelligent Design,” which is still in process.)

We’ve also written almost a million and a half words of Liaden Universe® novels.  Add in the rest and we’re at a cool 2mil.

All of which sounds, yanno, like A Lot, until you start putting perspective into the picture.  That’s only 34 stories, and 14-or-21 novels.  Which suddenly doesn’t sound so impressive, after all, but does bring me to my point.

Why yes, there was a point to this, besides the public display of an unhealthy fascination with numbers.

I was once stopped, nicely, correctly* by a young writer at a convention.  They were working on their first novel and had a couple of specific questions.  Clearly, they had put some thought into what they were doing and were not just haring off in all directions at once (which I admire; being a hare of long standing), and we had a very pleasant talk.  They spoke of their hopes for their story and the characters living inside it, but, suddenly confessed, with a sort of half-glance under the lashes, that they were afraid that the manuscript was getting a bit. . .long, and there was still a lot of story left.

How long was it?  I asked. Words, not pages.

Gratifyingly, they knew this (really, this was a very serious and thoughtful writer; I want to read them somebody, and I think I will).  “Thirty-five thousand words.”

“Oh,” I said, “you’ve got plenty of room!”

“I do?”

“Sure — at least seventy thousand more words.  Try not to go more than one hundred fifty thousand, total, though.”

“I had no idea novels were so. . .long,” they said, which seems funny from someone who (as this writer was) had read reasonably widely in the field, but which also seems true of nearly everyone.  No one has any idea how long novels are, except novelists.  And editors, of course.

So, that’s the point — novels are long.  Not only that, but it takes a significant chunk of time to write a 100,000 words, not to mention revising, polishing, so forth &c.

Because novels are long and take so much time and effort to produce, it’s important to chose a project that you’re excited about; that you can live with, day in, day out, morning-noon-night, for four months to a year.  It’s important that your characters are interesting to you, and are people with whom you have empathy.  I can’t imagine anything much worse than having someone I loathe living in my head for a year.

If you want to write a book, try to have fun.  I know, I know; it’s Serious and Important Work, and we’re taught that Serious and Important Work ought to be dealt with, well. . .seriously.  Soberly.  It’s this mindset that for many years contributed to my referring to my writing as play, as in: “I’m going to go play now.”

. . .and so I shall.

————-

*They came up to me as I was leaning against the wall — waiting for Steve, as it happened — introduced themselves, explained that they were writing a novel, realized that, as Guest of Honor I was of course very busy, but wondered if I would have perhaps ten minutes over the weekend to talk to them; they were writing a novel and had some questions.  Polite and respectful.  Well done.