Hump Day Surprise: Part One is in Beta!

Huge milestone people! Part One of my WIP, To Kill the Goddess, has been through the Scribblerati, revised, and is now in beta draft. Wooooohoooooo!

Part One is the logical first third and opening act of my book. It is twelve chapters in length and clocks in at around 46,000 words and change.

Yes, it's a bit thick, but that's down about 7000 words from the last draft and I expect the average chapter length to decrease as the book progresses. In all, there are a total of 38 chapters and I'm targeting a total length of 120,000 to 130,000 words. Big, but not too big for an epic fantasy.

So what's next? In regards to Part One, I expect to begin distributing it to an as of yet undetermined group of beta readers. I do plan on letting the Scribblerati have another go at it, but I would also like to get some opinions from people whose perceptions aren't burdened by the original draft of To Kill the Goddess, a draft that I completely scrapped and rewrote based on the feedback I received from the Scribblerati.

As for Parts Two and Three, Part Two has made it through the Scribblerati and I intend to begin beta revisions soon. Part Three is in what I refer to as ‘solid draft’ form, meaning it's written, but not polished. I will probably begin working on that too, alternating with Part Two revisions.

So who's awesome?  ME!

Hump Day Surprise: Star Wars!

As I write this Star Wars Celebration V is in full swing. I see the tweets from the fellow Legion of Geek and while Star Wars has been a huge part of my life I can't say that I'm at all jealous of those who are there. While I may still pick up the occasional Star Wars comic or novel, I think that Star Wars is mostly done for me. I don't mean dead, I just mean done, a past chapter of my life, like college. It's something I'll look on fondly, maybe even revisit once in a while, but I don't think it will ever again be as all-encompassing as it used to be.

That said, there are times, like this, when I find myself thinking back to all the fond memories. Everything from sitting in the theater, trying not to pee in my Tough Skins while Luke, Han, Leia, & Chewbacca are getting smashed by the trash compactor , to the total madhouse midnight Toys "R" Us opening for Phantom Menace merchandise.

I think one of my favorite memories would have to be in the Special Editions first came out. I remember sitting in the theater with my lovely wife. The place was amped. People were practically bursting with excitement. Some guy in the front kept yelling “Chewie!” Then, chills went down my spine as the 20th Century Fox anthem played, the trumpet fanfare blared, and STAR WARS flashed onto the screen. The scroll rolled, we saw Tatooine, Leia’s Rebel Blockade Runner, laser flash, and Darth Vader’s Imperial Star Destroyer filling the screen.

Classic.

What's your favorite Star Wars memory?

Hump Day Surprise: the Metaphor Rant

So it's after 11 o'clock on a Monday evening (yes, I know this is Wednesday -- just roll with it :-) ). I need to get up in six or so hours, and I'm WIDE awake. That has a little bit to do with our Scribblerati meet up tonight and that always winds me up some, but it has a lot more to do with the chocolate mocha thingy I so wisely chose to down at 7:30 PM.

Not my brightest move ever.

So here I am, my mind spinning with all sorts of things, but mostly with the fact that sometimes I hate writing fantasy. To be honest, it's more of a love/hate, like when people talk about their cat chewing up their computer power cord, or their kids throwing a tantrum in the grocery store. Yes, I do love fantasy, just like people love their cats and their kids, but there are times when it drives me crazy, like when I would love nothing more than to use one tiny little frakking metaphor.

I suppose most fantasy writers have this problem to some degree. For instance, you can't use commonly known metaphors like, ‘an electric feel,’ because there isn't electricity in most fantasies. My situation is even worse, and it's entirely of my own making. My story takes place on a completely different world and not even a world, but a moon where even the plants are different colors than they are here on earth. So, forest green? Can't use it. Saying the air has a spring-like feel? Can't use that either.

And it gets even crazier. Take “winds me up,” for example. That's a metaphor based on watches and clocks. Clocks could potentially exist in my world, but don't, and throwing that phrase into my world would adjust ring hollow.

Ring hollow… I think I could actually use that one….

So what is it that has me worked up tonight? “Pancake like leaves.”

It just so happens that the leaves on illiana trees look like pancakes. They do. They are round, flat, a little thick. Pancakes. But can I use that? Noooooooo. Because when I do, the ever insightful Scribblerati began to ask, “Do they make pancakes in your world? And if they do, would they really call them pancakes because nothing else in your world is named the same as it is here on earth.” To which my reply is, “What if I add a scene where they go out for brunch and order pancakes and goat cheese omelettes?”

Yah, that won't work.

Sigh. So back to the drawing board.

PS. I can't use drawing board either.

Hump Day Surprise! A few thoughts about Scarlet #1

I wasn't always a fan of comics.

I used to be one of those people who looked down their noses at comics. They weren't real writing, so why waste your time with them? Clearly, I didn't know what the hell I was talking about.

I first started reading comics back around the time that horrible travesty otherwise known as The Phantom Menace came out. I was a pretty big Star Wars fan boy back then and I heard they were coming out with a comic about one of those fascinating side characters (Ki Adi Mundi) that Lucas dreamed up but did absolutely nothing with. So I bought it.

And the rest is history.

Now I read a lot of comics and I have been anticipating the release of Scarlett ever since I first heard about it. I may not be a Star Wars fan boy anymore, but I am a big fan of Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev.

So without further ado…

This book is a jewel. From the opening page to the last, this book rocks.

As I have become a better novelist, I have learned to better appreciate and recognize good writing in all forms. As an avid comic reader, I have learned how difficult it is to write a good story in the graphic novel medium. Comics writers don't get to write exposition. They can't explain how a character feels, they have to show us. They do this through dialogue, but also through layout; setting up panels, their content, character placement, etc. This makes the artist as much responsible for the success of a comic as the writer.

We novelists have it easy. We can paint a setting through exposition, and then turn around and tell you exactly how a character feels. Comic writers provide a brief description of all this and then turn it over to the artist. Talk about scary! Fortunately, Bendis and Maleev are both masters.

Don't get what I'm talking about? Well check this out. Here's the setup: Scarlett just killed a cop and she's trying to decide how she feels about that.

© 2010 Jixworld Inc.

That is mastery. Any novelist would be estatic to convey a moment as well as Bendis and Maleev do in these two frames and those handful of words.

Go buy it. You won't be disappointed.

So if I had to choose my own name…

Hello everyone, it's Hump Day, and you know what that means, right?

No?

You don't remember a few months back when I said I was going to make a “Hump Day Surprise” post on every Wednesday?

Well, really, who can blame you? I mean, I had the best of intentions but then craziness ensued, and then laziness followed, and I think you get the idea. So, from now on, I think I'm going to put extra emphasis on the “surprise” part and just leave you all guessing as to when I'm actually do get around to doing one of these.

Now, having said all that, onward!

I recently came to the conclusion that I need to choose a pen name. It isn't something I ever thought I would do, but an unexpected need for anonymity has conspired to make me think otherwise. No, it's not that I'm afraid that someday in the distant future some crazy fan will track me down, rather, I need to keep my work life and my writing life separate.

Now, you would think that having a day job and writing on the side wouldn't be mutually exclusive, but you would be wrong. You would also think that your coworkers would be supportive of your extracurricular endeavors in the same way that they are supportive of other people's need to spend time with their families, but you would be wrong about that as well. You may have a different experience, but I have discovered, quite unexpectedly, that having an active, social media presence unrelated to my day job can be a liability.

Hence: pen name.

And now that I'm done bitching, here's the fun part! I need to choose a pen name. Most of the ones I've thought of so far are variations on my own name and mash ups of my last name with my wife's. Here's a few:

Sean Patrick
Patrick Shawn
Sean Raelin
Patrick Raelin

And you can get a whole bunch more variations by switching Sean with Shawn and Raelin with Raelyn.

I think I have a favorite but I'm curious, what do you think?

Hump Day Surprise #2!

Or, A Couple of Thoughts about Comics

For those who don't know, I'm a pretty big comic fan. I used to be one of those novel readers who snubbed comics, deriding them for not being worth reading.

How wrong I was.

Comics are awesome. Sure, there are some that are little more than an excuse for superheroes to beat up on one another but there are others with real depth, character motivation, fantastic art, and a plot every bit as exciting as something you’ll find in a novel.

That said, here's today's thoughts about comics.

Thought numero uno

I recently read this article talking about digital comics distribution. I have always thought that if any printed media had a real shot at making it big in a digital world, it was comics. It seems like the big comics makers think so too. Both DC and Marvel embraced digital distribution long before most traditional publishers.  Today, you can get digital subscriptions to comics and read them right on your computer.

But why would I want to do that? I don't want to do that anymore than I want to read a novel on my computer.

Comics, IMHO, were made for something like the iPad. The day I can get a digital subscription of The Gunslinger, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Powers, or anything that Brian Michael Bendis writes is the day that I'm one step closer to handing a chunk of cash to Apple.

Thought numero two-o

I want to give a big shout out to Things from Another World.  TFAW is where I get all of my comics. Yes, I know I should support a local comics shop, but I live way out in the burbs and while Minneapolis does have some fantastic comic shops none of them are even remotely convenient for me. So, I buy online.

Recently, I had a problem with my order. I e-mailed TFAW asking them to send out the correct comic with my next shipment. But no, that wasn't good enough for them. They are immediately shipping the correct comic, at no cost to me.  Pretty nice. Almost like they were my local comics shop.

Hump Day Surprise!

I have decided, all by my lonesome and without permission of the rest of The Scribblerati, that I'm going to start a new weeklyish column. This column will probably have nothing to do with writing and everything to do with me (or other Scribblerati) sharing too much information on things no one cares about.  Now, I know most of you are already thinking, "Shawn, the weeklyish writing oriented posts on this blog already leave me in a state of blissful contentment. Why would you want to ruin that?"

Because that's the way I roll, baby.

So here goes.

Today's topic: Two Songs Rolling around in My Head.

1. Turn it Off by Phantogram.  I just recently downloaded this album and it is either pure genius or complete crap and I can't decide which yet. The one thing I do know is that this song WILL NOT STOP playing in my head.
2.  The Cure by Tegan and Sarah.  The album this song comes from (Sainthood) is yummy. There are even better songs on the album, but 89.3 The Current has this in rotation right now and I can't escape it!

What's rolling around in your head?