Rolling on the dough

[wayfaringwordhack]

After chatting with slmcgaw and then rabiagale, I've narrowed down my playing field to a comfortable dimension. I now have a tentative structure that will allow me to bring in all of the elements that excite me about the location, history, and characters; clearly defined character arcs; and an overarching motif to give the whole the coherency it needed.

Toward the end of our conversation, rabiagale asked me, "Are you always this ambitious?" Yes, I think I am. This time, though, I'm trying not to let the fear of failure confine my ideas and bridle my creativity. But already, even before starting, the certainty that I can't make it work (ie make the final product match the mental dream) is my constant companion in all my research moments.

This afternoon, mana_trini so encouragingly said, "You're insane. What you're proposing sounds so difficult, but I love you because you don't let that insanity brake you." Thank you, love. I think. :-P He then proceeded to say, "You're going to sell this, and then we are going to be so rich. I'm going to have three specialized spearguns and four surf boards and a huge sailboat. Oh man, we're going to be rolling on the dough."

ETA J actually said: "You don't let the FEAR of insanity brake you."

Comments

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

As much as I've claimed to now have a handle on the project, I still feel incapable of writing a blurb (which I should do before starting the story!), but the story will be alternate history set in Babylon, circa 1800s, and will involve archaeology, murder, and the pursuit of justice and identity told by a central narrator whose account is enriched by and dovetails with the legend of Semiramis and the diary and letters of the slain archaeologist.

[footlingagain.livejournal.com]

I love your not-blurb.

alternate history set in Babylon, circa 1800s, and will involve archaeology, murder, and the pursuit of justice and identity told by a central narrator whose account is enriched by and dovetails with the legend of Semiramis and the diary and letters of the slain archaeologist.

Not much to do, then. You'll have it finished by the end of the next Ni90 round, I'm sure ;-)

*Added on the edit* And you have a plan! I'm so impressed!

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Yeah, not much to do at all. Piece of cake, really. So, when is the next round? August 2013? I just might be finished by then. ;-P

I'm sure planners all over the world would shudder to see what passes for a plan in my book. *lol*

[footlingagain.livejournal.com]

Next round starts on 1 December, allegedly :)

I'm sure your plan will be just right - the mark of a great plan is flexibility, right?

Mine is so flexible it won't even stand up. Though that might be because I don't have one....

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Next round starts on 1 December, allegedly :)

Well, if I can do some cramming, I could probably be ready to participate seriously again. I was silly to think I could do NaNo and jump in 2/3 of the way into this Ni90 round.

Mine is so flexible it won't even stand up. Though that might be because I don't have one....

*lol* Wanna try to give me a not-blurb? The Maelstrom Dark (is that the title?) has had me curious for a while now. :D

[footlingagain.livejournal.com]

A not-blurb. Ooh...

You set me quite a task there, I had to think about it for a while because I hardly know how to describe it!

Okay. The Maelstrom Dark (yes, that's its working title) is set in ancient Greece - as you've probably guessed from my cries and tantrums.

Everybody knows about Helen of Troy, but not many people remember that she had a twin, Clytemnestra. If they do remember, the only thing they remember, really, is that she and her lover murdered her husband, Agamemnon (victorious leader, king of kings) when he got home from the Trojan War. She's the anti-Penelope, if you like ;-)

I kept wondering why. I knew some of it - the mythology and Aeschylus's tragedy actually tell you - but I wanted to fill in the gaps. It's taken 150K words and it's still not finished, but I'm getting there. Well, I hope I am.

For Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, it's fight to the death. It was from the moment they met, but they didn't really understand that, at first.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Ooh, that sounds interesting, too--and challenging. I love the stories that come on by asking, Hey, what about that person? Why did they do that?

The Maelstrom Dark--me likey mucho!

[footlingagain.livejournal.com]

The Maelstrom Dark--me likey mucho!

Thank you! That's a great relief - I'm hopeless at titles, even working ones. As usual, I had to steal this from someone else *g*

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I'm no good at titling, either. I don't even have a working title for my new project yet. I need to come up with something, though.

[mindseas.livejournal.com]

It sounds like a fascinating project, but I understand why you'll need to do research. Plenty of people will know if you get the 1800's wrong. I myself love that period and archaeology as well. Babylon always seems to take second seat to Egypt, so I think you'll have a unique angle. Just checked Semiramis, and it seems there are plenty of myths there to work with. Great stuff!

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean about Egypt. When I had the story flash that involved an archaeologist and ancient culture, my mind automatically conjured up that notorious, pharaoh-infested country. *g* So, I stepped back with a questioning look at said mind and mind promptly admitted to having made a mistake.

As to the 1800s being hard to pull off, yes, yes, yes; however, I am doing alternate history and so have a bit of wiggle room. Still, in order to pull off the totally imaginary things, I'd like to have a solid base of veracious details.

[mindseas.livejournal.com]

I've been researching my alternate history where Liszt marries one of Tara's selves around 1871 and travels to America. I started with biographies of Liszt, his published letters, his daughter's diary, and a book (in French) about the person who might become the Tara character. Then I went into interesting contemporary figures: Disraeli and Tesla. And then I had to get CD's with all of Liszt's music. The music unfortunately put brakes on the project--I don't much like his later works. But I gathered a lot of useless facts, such as they had doughnuts. I could probably intelligently read something set in that period.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I think reading biographis is a good way to go. I'll need to get my hands on a few. I'm just wondering how much research I need to do before I can lay down a draft. Is it better to have a solid story with good details upfront or a skeleton that can later be personalized, that is the question. As long as it takes me to get material here, I'm sure I'll crack and write a little bit, at least, in the coming weeks. Otherwise the energy for the project might peter out.

[mindseas.livejournal.com]

I think the question of how much research to do depends on your writing personality. Recently I've come to believe that I'm very much a first draft person. Writing a novel for me is sort of like blowing glass. If it doesn't come out right the first time, I can't seem to patch it up. It just shatters. I'm better off throwing it away and trying another piece--or the same piece again but without one word from the previous draft. So I would have to do all the research first, then let it percolate in the subconscious, then write.

But you may be a different sort of writer. Only you know the answer to that.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

That's a lovely metaphor. Having completed only two books (and one of them still in very rough draft form), I can't rightly say what kind of writer I am. TTD was a project that I just started and did very little research on. Because of my lack of planning and my desire to get it right the first time, it took me 6 years to get a result that might be saleable. With TBU, I didn't want that happening again, so I did a lot of research (gathering info, really), a lot of planning, and then set it aside. When I got back to it, I didn't read through all of my gathered tidbits, just started writing according to my plan. And now I have a very ugly draft on my hands. However, I have noticed that I like to have a pretty clean base and then build from there.

I definitely wouldn't relate my approach to that of sculpting. I build rather than take away to reveal the story.