Monthly Archives: October 2011

Edioting Wind

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My father refused to edit the novel manuscripts he wrote in the middle of his life. His vision of the author was the solitary figure scratching out words on paper, each pen stroke deliberate, final. Others could puzzle over his handwriting and type the manuscript into the computer. Others could worry over the ways his book didn’t work as well as it might. Dad made some desultory efforts to sell a couple of his ‘books’ but he genuinely seemed unconcerned when he didn’t succeed.

Years later, he would read and re-read the novels he’d written, and (according to Mom) he could not have been more pleased with what he’d accomplished. Reading his own stuff, he beamed.

As I prepare to edit the Witch of the Colonies manuscript for the bajillionith time, I think of my Dad, and though I miss him I can’t help but smile.

We should all derive such satisfaction from our hard work.

Goodbye Mr. Kitsch

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An intriguing essay from M.D. Lachlan over at io9.com posits that ‘fantasy… is inherently kitsch.’ The full article is more nuanced, with Lachlan eventually settling upon the notion that kitsch, and fantasy authors’ responses ‘…will continue to define Fantasy for years to come.’

Personally, I hope original characters and stories play that defining role. I’d like to read more fantasy books with the wit and humanity of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, Orson Scott Card’s Enchantment or Glen Cook’s Black Company series.

Look, I’m not philosophically opposed to kitsch, or its close relation camp, so beautifully explored by Susan Sontag. But I do think those topics are related more to an appreciation of Robert Jordan, in specific, than fantasy in general.

What We Learned Last Night

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“Hey,” I told Paul, in my usual articulate morning way. “In my dream last night?” Paul grunted and fumbled for his glasses.
“Yeah?”
“I heard you saying I was a terrible writer.” Paul peered at me, hair crazy like a mad scientist, gray-blue eyes wide with concern.
“That’s a terrible thing to say,” he observed, voice scratchy with sleep.
“It’s okay, though,” I told him. “In my dream, I heard you say that, and sure – my feelings were hurt – but I realized I could differentiate between how you felt about my writing and how you felt about me.”
“Well,” Paul said, sounding surprised. “That’s good. Right?”
“Sure,” I nodded, “I mean… it’s great that my dream self is so much more advanced than I am.”
Paul laughed.

He thought I was kidding.

And We’re Off!

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The query letter has been printed, proofed (by me and Kiwi) and signed. The stiff, oversize envelope purchased specifically for this effort (more attention grabbing, right?) has been discarded in favor of a simple business envelope. The stamp has been attached to the upper right corner, the address carefully transcribed in my atrocious handwriting.

Into the blue public mailbox query letter number one goes. My heart drops as the metal lid clangs closed.

Maps & Legends

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Maps fascinated me, even as a kid. Two in particular stood out: TSR’s Map of Greyhawk and of course the maps created by the old master himself, JRR Tolkein. What would a Sea of Black Ice look like, standing on its shore? What lay off to the West, where the elven ships are bound?

My own sketches in service of the novel are, at best, utilitarian. In my mind, I picture florid seventeenth-century fonts, small illustrations for cities, careless arcs for hills and even a fanciful kraken in the bottom right panel filling what would otherwise be an empty and unremarkable patch of blue. I uncap my pen, hunch over my desk, and go to work. But when I pull back, I’ve got something that looks like the work of an experienced cartographer… after he slammed his fingers in the car door, blinded himself with a stream of pepper spray and gulped down a half-dozen shots of well vodka.

Boy, I wish I could draw.

Query Query

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This is the text of the query letter I’m planning on sending out to agents. If anything doesn’t ring true, seems forced, or could benefit from more consideration, I’d be mighty grateful if you’d let me know in the comments.

UPDATE of 10/26: A reference to this site will be included in the query letter, along with a call-to-action to visit.

“17-year-old Abigail Moore, apprentice witch, is collecting herbs along the New Arkady shoreline when she stumbles over a young man, insensible, cotton shirt, trousers, and jacket waterlogged and cold to the touch. As Abigail pulls the young man’s arm over her shoulder, she sets into motion a chain of events that will see her driven out of her cottage, pursued by musket-toting Royalist soldiers, ululating toad-people and (most dogged of all) doubts about herself.

Will Abigail choose the virginity the path of witchcraft requires? Or will Abigail allow herself to be drawn into the revolution breaking out around her?

Inspired by authors like Diana Wynne Jones and H.P. Lovecraft, the original “Star Wars” film, and video games like the Fable series, “The Witch of the Colonies” might be described as ‘girl Harry Potter meets steampunk Huck Finn in serial format,’ but only if I was desperate to get the idea across as quickly as possible. “Witch of the Colonies” will serve as the first novel in an ongoing series, followed by “Demon of the Colonies” (a work in progress.)

Per your request, I have attached the first 10 pages of my manuscript, currently weighing in at 82,000 words. Thanks in advance for the time.

I look forward to hearing from you.”

Thanks, oh curious readers!

Monkey Man

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Northern Arcadia is meant to be evocative of Colonial North America, but not identical. The human colonists are not uniformly or even predominantly white, and tension between the races is largely unknown. Humans are too busy trying to survive vicious winters, soil that doesn’t support traditional crops, and raids by ululating, bloodthirsty frog-men to quibble over the color of another human’s skin.

Like I say, Northern Arcadia is not identical to North America.

But when it came time to design the second native race of Northern Arcadia – the ape people, also known as the Ghu, Ghu-ba, Goobs, and Goobers – I began to worry about racism and misleading parallels. Significant numbers of the Ghu have been captured by other Ghu tribesmen, sold into slavery, and set to work on human plantations. Reviewing an early draft of the manuscript, I worried about casual readers misinterpreting the significance of these details, and mistakenly seeing the Ghu-ba as stand-ins for the African people kidnaped and brought to North America.

I considered excising the Ghu altogether. I drafted a version that replaced the ape-people on the plantations with convict labor and elephants in harness, but the pachyderms felt out of place, and the economics of shipping conscript labor overseas seemed implausible. Some rudimentary research turned up partial antecedents – convicts shipped overseas to be imprisoned, local convicts being used for labor – but not both at the same time.

A thought struck me. Maybe I had this issue the wrong way around? Maybe I didn’t need to make efforts to make the Ghu seem less human. Maybe I needed to invest more effort – more humanity – into the secondary characters in Witch of the Colonies who happen to have dark-colored skin. That seems like the more rewarding – if more difficult – path.

These things are always obvious after I’ve taken the time to figure them out.

Creature (Double) Feature

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Designing the two races of sentient non-humans in Northern Arcadia has been a real challenge, and the source of many manuscript revisions.

The ‘ssssla’ described in the earliest manuscript drafts as ‘fish-people’ have drifted into ‘frog’ territory, and will ultimately owe much of their appearance to the family of American toads. I’m also leaning towards replacing ‘ssssla’ with ‘dhao bo’; I’m hard pressed to imagine sentient toads picking a name for themselves with all those stray sibilants.

Designing the race of ape people, the ghuba, has posed different challenges. More on that tomorrow.