Category: Writing

Editing

Soon it will be time for AJ to run through the descriptions and dialog tags and do some good editing of the words actually and not just the syntax of stuff.

To help with that AJ will likely use a few cool dictionaries.

The emotions dictionary is pretty cool.

The series linked from amazon is all pretty cool too.

AJ is utilizing AutoCrit to help find the weak areas but is not using the tool itself. Mostly because the formatting is shit. And it’s actually easier to just fix it in Dabble and go from there. And then resubmit the document when an edit is complete and reevaluate. We’ve never had good luck with editing it there — losing work and stuff. So this is the best solution we’ve found so far.

Question of the Day

KM Weiland posed a question on facebook. “What is the inciting incident of your WIP”

AJ of course answered it.

It depends on which one you want as I have the book plot, the multi-book arc story, or the multi-book multi-arc overall story.

The inciting incident of the book is when my MC is first tasked with hunting down the dragon who robbed a bank and showed herself to the human world.

The inciting incident of the arc story is at the end of the first book (the plot above) when my MC finds out that he was supposed to die as a baby and that he has a twin sister.

The inciting incident of the overall story of the current multi-arc story is in the first chapter of the first book (the plot above) when he meets the blue-eyed man at the club who was sent to spy on him by the big bad.

AJ’s currently reading Save the Cat! writes a novel and going through the exercises for the Last Phoenix and this all sorts of plays into that. But right now she’s questioning whether or not the first book is about me, or Alex. And it really becomes more of a question which story is being told. Alex changes more than I do in book 1. He goes from trusting no one to trusting me and essentially forgiving me.

But if we look at the next larger picture. Does Alex grow beyond that one thing? Yes he’s an integral part of my life. But for the Ascendant and his own supernatural growth does he? He trusts more people. He accepts me, Ant. He’s my hero but the hero of the story? Is his story more interesting than mine? AJ wants to write Alex’s story. But it’s not my story. So I think we are going with I’m the hero of this story.

Because overall while Alex plays a big part of it, it’s still revolving around me. Me becoming Ascendant, then falling and fixing things, and ultimately saving the world. I mean isn’t that the chosen one’s shtick?

Rubber Ducky Your the One

So AJ was editing The First Hunt and she wrote this explanation for a writing group she’s part of and wound up answering her own problem. This method of problem solving is called Rubber Duck Debugging. AJ uses it on a regular basis when she’s working on code. And apparently it works for all sorts of things. But for AJ it only really works if she writes it down. Brain to finger coordination is so much better than brain to mouth.

Here is what AJ wrote:

So I’m editing my novel.  And in order to keep the scene, I need to be able to define the elements of a scene/sequel pairing otherwise it’s trashed.  This particular scene could be cut, but the facts involved in the scene establish a little bit about Nox’s ability that you really can’t see otherwise.

Nox has just been informed that he’s going to be Valedictorian of his class and he needs to give a speech.  Which he doesn’t want to do because the rest of his classmates would make it epically horrible and he wants to avoid it at all costs, so his plan is to fail the remainder of his tests and papers to drop his grades down to the third in the class.  Which we will say is theoretically possible, but I’m not going to actually calculate exact numbers or anything.  Nox calculated the precise number of questions he can answer to fail the tests but still does all the work on the scratch/test paper but doesn’t log the answers in the key he’s turning in.

Scene:

Goal: To become third in class and not give a speech
Conflict: Only finals and a on paper left to turn in for the end of the class
Disaster: 

Sequel:

Reaction:
Dilemma: 
Decision:

So I need some sort of disaster.  He has to graduate today, I’d prefer his ploy actually work so I don’t actually have to write his speech or work it into the story since he has never given it any version.

I suppose I could rework the goal/conflict/disaster

Th goal is not to give a speech

The conflict is he has straight As

The disaster is he only has two finals and a paper he’s willing to fail in order to achieve his goal

The reaction then would be to use his ability to calculate the exact number of answers he has to leave blank for each test in order to just lower his grade just enough to become 3rd in class

The dilemma is his mentor will be upset with him if he fails his tests

His decision is to go through with it and deal with the consequences from his mentor.

Sound logical?

I think that worked out well enough… thank you Rubber Duck Debugging!

 

Opening Paragraph

AJ’s editing on top of writing.  We have no new content to post today we might later but we don’t have any at present.  So we’ll talk editing for the next couple days and you can yell at me if you don’t like it.

Though content might slip out if I don’t find something else to talk about.  And I’ve already missed 5 days this year.  Such a bad year… but that’s five days in 3 years I’m pretty happy with it overall.

Anyway.  AJ is editing the First Hunt.  So this is the VERY first time new readers will see me.  Get to hear me and fall in love.  So this opening Paragraph needs to be strong and pull you in.

Let us hear what you have to say about it.

Dorian called me into his office and was promptly pulled away from his desk as soon as I sat down. Dorian’s office was like most of the other offices in The Academy, probably like all the offices of every Venatori anywhere. The large almond tube monitor, from way back in the 90s, sat on top of the almond-colored CPU box. The antique rattled away with loud fans. The keyboard was missing printed letters from overuse. Dorian’s whole office was sparse, nothing on the walls, not even a picture on his desk. It was bland.

AJ’s working very diligently on MRUs Motivation Reaction Units.  She’s taking each scene that matches the scene/sequel goals to decision and working through each paragraph making MRUs.  The first scene is completed and the grammar and the spelling have been made.

Would you be interested in seeing it?

Prophecy

As my story is written we are finding prophecy to be part of the world. Something I despise with all my heart. My life is not written. My life is mine.

I know I go on and on about prophecy and fate and destiny. The harbinger of my life. And I’m not the writer, I get to live through the hell AJ creates, but I can say at least I’m not one of George RR Martin’s characters in Game of Thrones right?

But this is a story that does prophecy right. I admire it.

Syfy Wire writes a good article about it all. If you’ve not seen the series then I suggest you don’t read the article.

The very last paragraph resonates with what I believe of prophecy.

Every character sees themselves as the hero of their own story. That’s why the ones who hear these pronouncements (Jaehaerys, Rhaegar, Cersei, Daenerys) always failed to understand what they’ve been shown. In the world of Westeros, all prophecies do is mess with people’s heads. The answer is never the one anyone sees coming.

AJ has a lot of hard times coming for me. One actually plays to the first line of that article, and to a writing prompt she saw – or a quote or something

Everyone is the villain in someone’s story.

This includes me. Somewhere in some one’s story I’m the bad guy. I know hard to fathom right? But AJ’s going to write that next. That will probably be the next arc of my story. My becoming is almost done. AJ’s hoping to finish the story by July and work on something else fun and not canon. But fun.