Killing Characters with a Purpose

Killing characters is one of those things that I have a hard time with. I’ve always felt that a character serves the story better by being than by dying. Of course, that depends on the circumstances. 

It always bugs me a little when a character dies and it serves nothing else than shock value, or to give the hero that extra push. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes it works great, but other times it feels unnecessary. Usually the unnecessary version involves a hero who you know is already going to do the thing and win the things at the end of the thing. So when a supporting character dies to push the MC forward, there’s that moment of “he was going to do that anyway…”

That’s where it usually loses its grip for me. When the death is meant to just be an added layer of angst onto an already steaming pile of angstiness. It’s just too much.

A death works best when it propels the story forward or causes a character to react in a way that is, in a sense, out of character. It’s making the pacifist do something extremely aggressive and we believe it because they’ve been pushed so far. Or, it’s killing that King or High Lord and as a result having a war ensue that lasts for the next three books. 

But, with each character that dies there’s a sense of opportunity being lost. An opportunity to tell more stories, to develop them, to explore their relationships with others. And one of the reasons I’ve still been averse to the killing of main characters, is that the impact always fades (especially in a series). Maybe I’m a wuss in that way, but something about a character fading away to become a footnote bugs me.

Sometimes it is necessary. I’ve definitely read books where main characters die and I can’t imagine that same story working otherwise. Maybe I just haven’t thought up one of those stories yet.

Making Mistakes and Moving Forward

I'm still pretty new to this self-publishing thing, but I've already made a couple mistakes that I don’t plan on repeating. That’s part of the process, stumbling and bumbling forward not knowing what the hell is going on while everyone is screaming.

There are some smaller mistakes that feel more like little bumbles here and there. One is trying to figure out what an “online presence” is and how to manage it. Another is not sticking to schedules or getting distracted and jumping from project to project and never actually finishing anything. 

But the biggest one must have been the botched release of Moon Breaker. It was a little over a year ago, and although I’m still proud of the story and the world (and would like to revisit it) I still messed up pretty bad. I thought I could edit it myself, which proved to be completely wrong. You can imagine the soul crushing debilitation that squeezed my nethers when the first review said Moon Breaker had “poor english.” 

Unfortunately, it was pretty true. My brain seems programmed to ignore errors. There are times when I reread a sentence multiple times and in my head its fine, but the next day I realize its fuel orf teepos ad earors hwo culd eye msis tehm.  

After getting in contact with an editor and sorting out the manuscript it felt like the damage was already done. The version now doesn't have the same errors the original did but the whole thing is pretty much dead in the water. 

I’d be lying if I said it didn't put me in a funk for a while. There was no one else to blame but myself. I knew it. But being the brain frazzled self-critical anti-me goblin that I am, I let it crawl way too deep into the part of my brain that runs the Keep Moving Forward You Dope processor. 

During that time I wrote the first draft of a novel. And it helped. Even in the funk I still kept to writing daily, even if my word count suffered. Looking back, it doesn’t feel like wasted time and I plan on polishing up that novel sometime soon. But while I was writing it I had the idea for the fantasy novella series the Investigative Privateers. 

I have no idea if the first one is going to be any good. I’m probably supposed to act like an infallible creative God-Thing that has utter confidence in all my creations and will never ever mess up. Well, I’m not confident in my stories. Probably because I’m not confident in anything I do. I can’t bake pre-made cookies without convincing myself I’ve messed up.

And sometimes I have to be reminded that just showing up is enough. The anti-me goblin is always picking and prying at the back of my brain, trying to dig up any excuse to stop. To find any reason to justify that “you’re not good enough” or that “you should give up.” Remembering that all you have to do is show up can really help. I’ve found that sitting in front of the computer and just starting a sentence, even if I have no idea where it’s going, helps open up the floodgates. Once you make the first little crack, the rest will come surging forward because it wants out and you’ve given it an opening.   

The above post by Ksenia Anske (who is awesome and you should all go follow) popped up at just the right time. The anti-me goblin was working a particularly juicy node of self-doubt when I was smacked in the face by the image of a bird wearing a tiny hat saying “don’t fucking stop.” (I'm paraphrasing.)   

So I won’t stop. I’ll keep showing up. And do the best I can. And take it seriously. That is one thing that’s important. Taking it seriously and caring about it. 

And to keep moving forward no matter what. So that’s what I’m going to do. I invite you to watch me bumble through this weird and exciting process. 

I'm going to go bake some cookies (and try not to set anything on fire).

Editing The Horned Scarab

The Horned Scarab is a fantasy novella set in a prolonged bronze age. It follows two self-titled Investigative Privateers in the river city Ghorad-Gha.  

There are a few different types of magic, but the main one is Channelling. Channellers can call on the power of the Nvir, a mysterious cosmic force, and create powerful blasts of white-hot energy. If they try to channel too much at once, then the Nvir will essentially overload them and they’ll turn to a crispy pile of not-alive. This is the power that the main character, Arn, has. Note: Names, terms, and details are all subject to change throughout the editing process.

That’s probably as brief as it gets, but I don’t want to detail everything right now.  

This is the novella that I took a month off from. I was having some difficulty with the plot, and rereading it now I still think there’s a good amount of work to be done. I had hoped for a late October release, but it might edge up into an early winter depending on how long the edits take.

I have to focus on getting the story, plot, and characters right. As the editing goes on I’ll make a few more posts detailing certain aspects of the world. For now, I’m going to stare at the manuscript and smash my head against the keyboard until it transmogrifies into something good. 

In Other News: I’ve been posting a blog twice a week, but I’m starting to think that’s a bit much. So, for awhile I’m going to try posting once a week on Mondays. This way there’ll be more time to work on each post since I won’t have to churn them out so quickly.

Halfhearted Harpies

The story that I started working on for Camp NaNoWriMo was tentatively titled The Harpies Den. Unfortunately I only got to the twenty thousand word mark before I decided to shift focus and try writing some short stories instead. The odd thing was that I had started writing The Harpies Den to get my mind off my current work in progress novella that I was having trouble with. The Camp Nano story was intended to be silly and fun, and I didn’t take it seriously. But the more I wrote the more I started to really like it, and the more I started to like it the more it started to flounder. It felt like I should just put it aside and come back to it later. 

It might have been because I’d never meant for it to be taken seriously. As the story grew and became more complicated, and as I realized it needed more work (and that I wanted to make it work) the more I wanted to set it aside. It had become the foundation for a big project, one that I didn’t want to tackle now. I wanted to try and make it the best it could be and that would’ve taken a long time. 

This was the first time I started something with the intention of it going nowhere, and it turned out to be the wrong approach. I realized that one of the things I enjoy most about writing is trying to make something good that others will enjoy. 

But it did help me get my mind off that other novella, and some good ideas popped out of my subconscious during the Harpies Den. By the end I was ready to tackle it again, but wanted to wait the full month before diving back in, which is why I started the short stories. It was a way for me to keep writing but on something that I could come back to and polish up for possible submissions. I didn’t entirely abandon The Harpies though, I made a rough outline with some notes for where the story was going, so when I finally get back to it there will be some direction. Hopefully at some point I can release The Harpies Den as a full novel. 

For now I’ve gone back to that novella, and will be talking about it soon. I’m aiming for an Octoberish release, so stay tuned to my twitter, Goodreads, and blog for updates.