Archive for the ‘Pure Escapism’ Category

Editing Day

Posted: July 26, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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For whatever reason, I seem to have a blind spot when it comes to editing. I can read a draft through five times and not noticed a glaringly obvious error, and then still miss it on the sixth go. It is not that I can’t spell; I’m fairly good at that. I think it may be that I read the story rather than edit it.

But today I’m setting the goal of going through every word, every line of all the stories on the site, probably 60,000 words worth and editing them until my eyes bleed.

And then tomorrow I will find something I missed.

The Gift Rewrite Complete

Posted: July 25, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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Just finished doing the rewrite of The Gift (though I need to come up with a bit better name for it). Took five days and totals 15,000 words.

Next step is to do the editing and polishing. That may take almost as long, depending on time available.

Coming Up Next

Posted: July 23, 2009 in Pure Escapism, Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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Now that the latest two stories have been finished and added to the site, time to catalogue what is next on the To Do list.

On the website side of things, I need to keep slowly adding to the Worlds of Mist and Shadows page, expanding on it, and to also finish off writing the background notes on all of the short stories. So far about half of them are done.

The older stories need another minor re-edit and a slight modification to their layout, but that isn’t a priority as of now.

Story wise, the main aim is for the moment to finish the rewrite of The Gift and to make it ready to post. So far I have done almost 4750 words of the rewrite and that from just 1900 words of the rough draft. Given the rough draft was 7300 words long, I should easily reach between the 15,000 and 20,000 word mark I was aiming for for this story. It is probably going to take a few days to do that much output – unless I get lucky and manage to string together a couple of those 5K word days.

Beyond that I need to return to the plotting of Tears of the Moon and get working on the proper draft of that, as well as working on some more short stories. There are five more of them partially mapped out or started, including part three of Cara’s Choice and follow up stories for the android Ray, the Minotaur Nhaqosa and the Braega/Tudhala setting.

Lots to do, which is good.

Future Portents Completed

Posted: July 21, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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A second short story has had its editing complete today and been posted on the site.

Future Portents is a stand along story, set in the core world of the Mist and Shadows setting, Sharael. It is a bit of a different story, set at the dawn of the bronze age, when stone was beginning to give way to copper and then to bronze. It fits, chronologically, in between the time of the stories The Cahuac Cycle and those of The Maedari Book of Deeds.

The origins of it took place many years ago, but that initial story no longer worked for this setting, at least the second half of it, which required a total rewrite.

That second half may not make a lot of sense in parts;yet. It is in a way foreshadowing events yet to come and which will be revealed in other stories as I go along.

The Merchant’s Legacy Completed

Posted: July 21, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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I have finished off the editing for the latest short story in the Pure Escapism collection; The Merchant’s Legacy.

This is a follow up to the short story The Pit, though picks up the action some time afterwards and follows Nhaqosa, the giant white Minotaur and escaped gladiator, as he seeks the long roads to his home. The lands that he and his followers tread though are in the grip of drought and lawlessness, beset by bandits and monsters and seldom does he find a welcome. A chance encounter with the merchant Kythias may change all that…

It is the longest of the stories to date, coming in at around 11,000 words in length. I’m quite happy with the way it turned out, and the character of Nhaqosa. He is a fierce warrior when he needs to be, yet has a gentle side to him and at times can be a touch philosophical. I look forward to writing more stories with him in it in the future.

Rewrite Done

Posted: July 20, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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Just finished the rewrite of The Merchant’s Legacy. Turned a 7400 word rough draft into 10700 words. Quite happy with the way it turned out.

Next trick is the extensive editing needed for it, and the other recently completed short story, Future Portents, and then I can make the available to read, hopefully in a few days.

And then comes a long list of other things that need doing. But one thing at a time

Rewrite Update

Posted: July 17, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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Over the past three days I have had a rather productive spurt, clocking up almost 10,000 words. 5000 of those were yesterday. Haven’t managed to be so productive in, well, quite some time.

All of yesterday and art of the day before were spent on doing the rewrite of Future Portents and in the process I turned a 3700 word rough draft into 5700 words.

It will require editing (and more editing still – no matter how many times I seem to go over things with a fine tooth comb spelling and grammar errors always seen to get by me) and will require some rewording in spots. The end will need a bit more of a go over as well; I like how it is, but feel I could word it better.

Not sure when it will be going up yet to read. Hopefully not too long. Parts, particularly the end, may not immediately make much sense yet, as it is a bit of foreshadowing of things to come in later stories/events.

Next on the list to rewrite is The Merchant’s Legacy. The rough draft of that is 7400 words, so it may take a few days to do the rewrite.

Writing Projects Update

Posted: July 11, 2009 in Pure Escapism, Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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Thought I should do a post updating the various projects, where they currently stand and where they are hopefully headed.

The novel with the working title of Tears of the Mountain has been commenced, with 9K written of the first rough draft. Currently the rough draft is on a short pause as a proper plot and outline are worked on.

The prequel pilot novella, nominally called The Gift has been started, only around 4K done on it so far, but the story plot has been figured out. Aiming for 15-20K in length, it is intended to get a feel for the world, sort of like a pilot to a TV show does.

Pure Escapism is still coming along – need to finish off one draft and then edit it and a second draft to finish off the third volume. Hopefully this month, but certainly for next month.

For the contents of it, I have ideas for a number more short stories for a couple more volumes still. After that, while there will be plenty of one off stories, they will be fleshed out with ongoing series of stories which will, in theory, explore a number of different themes.

Cara’s Choice is going to be the only serial of them, an ongoing story told in episodes as they are released. It is an urban fantasy – nothing too out of the ordinary about it, except vampires will never ever be the good guys.

Of the core world of writing there are two main series, both from the earlier parts of history, but there will be other stories spread around in other time periods as well. I’ve had fun writing the myths of Aracan Hobgoblins in The Cahauc Cycle and so they will keep coming, and in time I may delve into myths of other cultures. The other series is planned to be The Book of Deeds, which relates the deeds of great Maedari Kings and Heroes during the bronze age of the world.

The series that I am calling The Primal Tales revolves around Braega and the lizardman Tudhala. There is plans for another character to join up soon. These stories aim to be wild and primal in nature, revolving around ruins, primeval creatures and the like. For these I have drawn inspiration in part from the Conan stories by Robert E Howard.

The other main series is those dealing with Nhaqosa the minotaur, which go by the name A Wanderer’s Tale. These are trending towards a more dark nature, and the world he finds himself in is more brutal and gritty in nature.

I have also been pondering on whether to write more about the sarcastic android Ray and his luckless master Brian in a sci-fi series, trying for a more humourous group of stories. May be fun to try something a bit more radical than the norm for me.

That is the plan at least – next step is to get it working.

Week In Review: Week Twenty Five & Twenty Six 2009

Posted: July 2, 2009 in Pure Escapism, Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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It would appear that I did not do one for last week, so here are two for the price of one.

Twenty six weeks down, twenty six to go. Had hoped to show more progress thus far, but slow and steady as the old saying goes.

Over the last two weeks I have finished off the second volume of Pure Escapism, started the third and also Tears of the Mountain, the working title of the novel I’ve started. I’m already 4200 words in to the rough draft of it after only a few days and I haven’t even really started. Pure Escapism Volume Three totals over 10K words also so far and I have yet to complete the main story, or start editing and fleshing out.

By next week those totals will hopefully be significantly increased.

July/Midyear Plans

Posted: July 1, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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We are now exactly half of the way through the year and it is time to take stock, recharge and plan ahead.

For July there are a couple of aims.

One is to finish off the third volume of Pure Escapism. That, however, is a secondary goal.

The primary goal for the month is to get working on the rough draft of the novel.

There are a few other minor things I’d like to see done – such as fix up the website – but they are only if time allows.

For the rest of the year, number one goal is of course finishing off the novel, hopefully finding a home for it. In addition I hope to put out at least two more volumes of Pure Escapism in that time.

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