Category: Writing

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March Update – Ides and Whatnot

Howdy!

It’s been a minute, as things usually go around these parts. Slow progress is still progress. Sometime back in January I decided that this was going to be the year I wrangle all my brain weasels and I seem to be making slow and steady progress on that as well as on my books. We keep going!

What Am I Working On?

Gil Girau Chronicles – Book One is still technically in revision but only because the farther I get into Book Two, the more I find that I need to foreshadow. There will soon come a point at which I just have to say “good enough” and get some beta readers’ eyeballs on this thing, as well as an editor. If I can get my art chops back for more than a few hours at a time, I’ll also start working on cover art and maps. (I do love me a good map.) As for Book Two, I’m caught up to and now beyond the point that I managed to reach in November, evaluating plots, and slowly building out more of the world as I go. I like to think that I’m more of a planner than a discovery writer, but sometimes I do get halfway through a plan only to discover that it’s wrong for the story. Current word counts for books one and two are 105k and 62k respectively. (Which is part of why they’re taking so long – ya boi ain’t used to writing 100k word novels. 😀 This is a good thing.)

Salt 2: Electric Boogaloo – Still on standby, but I’ve heard the cat is moving. (If you know, you know.) It’s been a slow and weird couple of years for both of us and this perpetually-delayed book is proof of that.

Secret Project – I have this bad habit of naming things in blog posts that never end up going anywhere or end up on the back burner cooking for months/years. But rest assured. There is another. There are actually a couple others, but I tend to rotate the back burner between them. They both involve worldbuilding and dinosaurs. Absolute shocker, I know.

The march goes on! Somewhat haphazardly, because I was never cut out to be a drum major, but at least I can keep a beat. Have a good Salad Day and keep on keeping on, y’all.

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June Update – Happy Pride! And Monsoon Season.

Howdy!

Happy Pride Month AND Jurassic June! I had no idea the latter was a thing but honestly, I’m loving it. (Most of it, anyway.) Prehistory and queerness can coexist and that’s half of Uthir’s design bible in a nutshell. Prehistory, queerness, and dragons.

It’s not technically Colorado’s monsoon season but it sure does feel like it. It’s been raining (and hailing, mostly hailing, actually) since mid-May and honestly, if not for flooding concerns, I’d be here for it. At least where I am, anyway – I’ve seen the hail and flood damage in some places just to the south and it is No Joke.

You know it’s been a boring few months when all I talk about is the weather. (In fairness, I find weather interesting.) The most excitement I’ve had in the last couple of months was Reed Timmer driving the Dominator up through the Front Range and Prehistoric Planet dropping a season 2. (Deserts and Badlands are my favorite episodes. Nobody mucks with Dreadnoughtus.)

After the last few years, I’ll take boring! Boring good.

What Am I Working On?

The Gil Girau Chronicles – The series formerly known as the Surveyors’ Guild Chronicles. Renamed partially because the Surveyors’ Guild doesn’t play quite as big a role in the second and third books (this will be a trilogy, as one does) and partially so that I can use that series title if I do a “so here’s how this guild was founded” story. I’m currently rewriting GGC Book One. Not all of it, but I realized I needed a few new scenes and was rushing a couple of developments. It also felt slightly aimless after a certain chapter, so I’ve adjusted some reasons for doing things. It’s going slowly – I’m writing little chunks at a time rather than trying to NaNo it, but it is, slowly, coming together.

Salt 2: Electric Boogaloo – Still on standby. I happen to know that a certain cat is in progress so it shouldn’t be too long, now. I may have to speedrun Urien’s book so that I’m ready to do rewrites after I slide this half-draft-half-outline to my dad.

And that’s about it. I’ve always got other ideas brewing but I’m doing my best to focus on just Gil Girau right at the moment. (That and Skyrim, but that’s ongoing.) Nagoa is patient, though his feathered, sickle-clawed sidekick might not be. I’m trying not to think too far ahead of myself here. See you in a few months, probably! (Ha-HAH past-me, I did make an update before July.)

Keep on keeping on, y’all.

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April Update – Duck Herding

Howdy!

How’d it get to be April already? Last time I checked it was November. And then I blinked. I’m going to assume I’ve just been in autopilot and decompression mode since then.

NaNo update – I completed NaNo! My final total was 67,805 words. The only problem is that I did not actually finish the book. I got pretty close to where I assume the end of it is, but I’m to this day still poking at the first draft. More on that later.

Decompressing – The last few months, I’ve been watching my dad get his strength back, if not his taste buds. He’s back to writing and walking and baking bread. (It is really good bread.) I couldn’t be more proud of him. It’s been a weird year. I hope I’ve learned something from it.

What Am I Working On?

The Surveyors’ Guild Chronicles – That’ll be Urien of Escathir and the rest of the trilogy. (Tentative titles: Shades of Salrohis and The Dragon of Gil Girau.) Titles are very much a WIP, much like the rest of it. I think I’m a few hundred words away from the end of the first book, as of writing this. It’s had a few setbacks. For example: a character that I thought was going to be a POV character ended up… not? Which means I need to rethink my outline for the rest of the series. I may not need to change much, but after a certain point this draft feels… a little bit meh. I’m looking for ways to diagnose the problem and tighten up the plots as we speak. (And watching a certain writer’s BYU lectures on YouTube, which has been very enlightening.) I’m learning a lot.

Barbarians 2: Electric Boogaloo – I’ve still got my half-a-draft sitting in my documents folder idling. Dad’s on a roll with his new stuff and I’m waiting for him to get the cat settled before I chuck this in his direction for Tan and Wazor’s half. My hope is that I’ll have Urien’s first book out before then and will be able to apply what I’ve learned to what I’ve got going on in Iron. (Title WIP.) Sukhetai is my problem child. I will find a way to make him Better.

Nagoa – I’m definitely not already planning Strongholds of the Sun or whatever Nagoa’s series ends up being called. I’ve done test writes of him with a friend and… Oh Boy. He’s fun. I’m excited to see what kind of story I can tell with him and his crew. All I have right now is a cast and a setting. I could discovery-write a first draft, just chuck ’em all into the jungle and see what happens, but I am very much an outliner. His “noodling” document currently consists of a bunch of names and ideas for what might be cool. Same world as Urien’s story, which means I can use the same magic system, but this takes place about a thousand years prior and on a different continent. With dinosaurs. As you do.

Other Noodling – I’ve started a folder full of ideas. Physically. It turns out my brain works better if I can see stuff in front of my face, which I learned when I put up a white board of sorts next to my desk so I could take temporary notes. I now have an actual folder with loose-leaf paper in it where I’ve started collecting story ideas. I’m excited. Stories will Happen. (Assuming I can get Urien’s hammered into shape.)

That’s all from me! Tune in in July when I remember again that updates are a thing I’m supposed to be doing. 😀 Which is mostly a joke… but we’ll see. Keep on keeping on.

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Slow Updates and Anniversaries

Hello my friends, long time no talk.

Seeing as my last update was in December and I haven’t spoken since I figured I should probably fill you all in on what my wee brain has been up to. Namely, too many things. So many things.

First of all I’m happy to announce that I’m in the process of scanning through the Tales of Esper Ravenwood and the Tales of Liserna, fixing typos and dialogue tags, and adjusting some personal and plot bugs that make me wince every time I think about them (like the end of Lightbringer). The Tales of Esper Ravenwood (Revenant, Scourgemarked, and Lightbringer) are all complete and have been updated in the Amazon Kindle store, as well as had a bit of a price drop. They and the first Redgate Chronicles book are also enrolled in Kindle Unlimited now, so you don’t have to pay for them in order to read them, if you’re a member. The Tales from Liserna (Runesong, Heartnet, and Winterdream) are still in progress but are next on the list. I’m also thinking about revamping the covers, but that’s on the back-burner.

Current projects in the works include finishing up the second Redgate book, New World, as well as a third(and maybe fourth) in planning, tentatively titled Other World. Esper Ravenwood is also bugging me about the tales from his “youth,” including how he met Veraggo, the beautiful Efreet fire dancer, and the rest of the band of bards he used to call family. His prequel series has a working title so far of The Adventures of Esper Ravenwood, or possibly The Bard Chronicles, I haven’t decided yet. Legion might be getting a prequel as well, currently titled “Gatewalker,” but I do believe that title is taken, so it will likely change. “A Long, Cold Road,” featuring Tiberius Winters and a shade named Erron Rook, is in a weird writing/planning limbo at the moment, while I try to figure out what goes where, and more importantly who. Blood of Hyperion is currently cryogenically frozen because the plot got so tangled that I might need a minor miracle in order to pick it up again. Last but not least, The Mythology of Omnia is a project that currently consists of a bunch of ideas for vignettes and short stores, Prose Edda style, about the First Gods, the Old Gods, and pantheonic shenanigans. My plan is to write the little vignettes in between doing other things, since they’ll all be in the same book, hopefully. I have dreams of short story collections, but short stories are very hard to write.

I’ve got a bunch of art projects going on behind the scenes, mostly for other people, but I did finally figure out what I wanted to do with the conglomeration of stories formerly known as both Charge and All’s Well in Asgard. I’ve never been good at sequential art, but I’ve decided to try vignette comics. We’ll see. I’ve got two pages done out of the first seven, so far.

It’s also April. This time last year – in a few days anyway – my best friend was in an auto accident and didn’t make it. First anniversaries are tricky at best. I’m dealing by way of having a list of projects the size of Mt. Evans. Obviously. Don’t worry, I have priorities. Just wanted to mention this as an explanation, if I’m a little bit more quiet than usual around the various tubes in the next few weeks.

See you when I see you, my friends.

ps. It apparently took me the better part of four years to figure out that having an undead main character definitely constitutes Dark Fantasy. WHOOPS.

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NaNoWriMo 2016

Heyo!

It’s that time again. Time to settle down with a good book and a warm coffee. Of course, I’ll be writing said hopefully-good book. It’s November! Which means it’s National Novel Writing Month, and this year once again I’ll be diving into the Redgate Chronicles with the second book in the series, New World. Marcus, Evaline, and Kisuke were such an awesome group to work with last year, so I’m excited to continue their story.

A quick project update: The Tales of Esper Ravenwood audiobooks are in production (by me, as usual) and will be up on YouTube eventually. Probably not this month. I’ll make an announcement for it when it happens, and I plan to release two chapters a week when I start releasing them. The audio versions of my books have been edited, and I think the story is, frankly, better. Which means I’ll also be creating revised-edition versions of the Kindle books at some point. The Lazarus Anthology and Blood of Hyperion are on the back burner at the moment, and at some point I’d like to visit Esper’s younger years in a series of prequels, tentatively titled the Adventures of Esper Ravenwood. That’s a long-term idea, though, and I won’t know until I get there. Other far-distant projects include a sci-fi universe in the works, slowly developing with the inspiration of my friend and romantic-fantasy writer, Sarahbeth Lazic, and the story formerly known by various names, such as Charge and All’s Well in Asgard. For some reason it isn’t working as a story, which means I need to sit down and have a chat with it at some point. But not this month.

This month I’m breaking out the old Redgate playlist on YouTube and settling in to see what mischief this band of reprobates get up to. To my fellow WriMo’s, as usual, may the words be ever in your favor, and good luck!

redgatenw-cover

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Character Tip: The Well of Nope

You ever have characters that, no matter what you do, you can’t seem to find a decent conflict for them? Maybe they’re a major support that needs a subplot, maybe it’s a main character who wants nothing to do with the story being told, or maybe it’s a character that should have a bigger role in the story but nothing is working.

Enter, the Well of Nope. Also known as the giant list of things that your character never wants to do, be, or witness.

There’s a phrase that I keep in my head when I’m writing, especially when I’m planning a story: “Never name the well from which you will not drink.” Not only useful to remember for character development, but decent life advice as well. Never say never, as in, never say you’ll never do something. This can have unintended side effects. For instance, when I was in school I constantly told myself that I’d never be an author because I don’t tell good stories. Esper and the rest of the Five Realms happened. I also told myself I’d never be a good multiplayer gamer, because lots of information overwhelms me. Overwatch happened.

So, what would your characters “never?” This question actually goes deeper than one might think. As an example: a young man never wants to become like his father. Which begs two questions: What about the father does he hate, and what is the father actually like? Answering those not only gives insight into the boy’s psychology, but also provides a direction and potential for growth. Let’s say the boy dislikes his father because he ignores his son. That would, of course, be from the young man’s perspective and not the objective truth. The flip side to that is that the father is a hard worker and wants desperately for his son to have a better life than he did, so he throws himself into his work.

That would mean a potential path of growth for the young man might go something like this: The son has grown up and made a name for himself, but now he has a young apprentice. He keeps working, but when he realizes that he’s ignoring said apprentice, he faces one of his “never’s” from the Well of Nope. From there he can confront that issue while maintaining his hard work, eventually becoming very much like his father, but not just the negatives. The end point might be that once he’s made peace with the fact that he is his father’s son, he realizes he is better able to manage both his work and his apprentice. He ends up knowing when to work and when not to ignore, and resolves whatever conflict stemmed from the neglected apprentice.

Marcus, from The Redgate Chronicles, also has an example, and one that illustrates how the Well of Nope can also be used as a massive catalyst. Because of his appearance, he believes he’ll never find love. When that belief is proven false, it gives him both hope and an exploitable weakness. It leads to him both screwing up in the worst possible way, but also to him trying again. The massive screw up? Changes the world forever, and leads him toward encountering and subsequently dealing with even more of his never’s.

While single never’s can have far reaching consequences, there are usually multiple answers to this question. Esper has a long list of never’s that he confronts throughout his story. All of them are double-edged swords, bringing both complications and boons. See how many answers you can find to that question, and pull them apart to see how the result would affect the character, both negatively and positively. How many of those can you weave into the plot? How many would change its course entirely?

From which wells would your character never drink? 

Think about it.
– E.J. Lowell

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The Redgate Chronicles: Old World

Chapter 0
The Great Mistake

The world, it seems, will never forget its chaos and be at peace. For more than a thousand years, wars, rebellions, and uprisings have kept the land in turmoil. At the slightest hint of lasting peace, another resurgence begins, and tensions with the Beast-folk races rise once more. Swept into the midst of that strife are three unlikely champions, pulled from the dungeons of Olsan and into the service of an unorthodox queen. With the world breaking down around them, and enemies rising in the shadows, it appears their only hope lies in the cryptic musings of a peculiar bard, and in ancient tales long abandoned. In the end, a desperate attempt at a solution may be their only way out. This is a tale of nobles and monsters, legends and demons, and a familiar face come to tell the story.

OLD WORLD

RedgateOWCover

Now available for Amazon Kindle.

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NaNo Update – Final Word Count

Wooooooooo!!!!

Hello, my friends!

I have finally, finally, after much heartache, distraction, and struggle, finished book one of the Redgate Chronicles. I say finally because shortly after the halfway point I had a couple of days where I only managed to write a couple hundred words because of a family vacation of sorts(totally worth it, btw) and a few days in the mix where I didn’t write anything because, *alien hands* life. Not sure what I’m complaining about. I’ve managed to outrun my dad, the man who inspired “The Lowell” as a unit of measurement for productivity(which, if you’re curious, is 10k words in a day. I can write a half-Lowell.) which is a feat in and of itself.

The final, verified word count came in at a whopping 60,998 words, which, for me, is absurd for a first draft. Old World is going to be a long book, as far as my writing goes, and I am so excited to read back through it in a month or so(maybe less if I work on something between then and now) and relive all of the hilarity, heartache, and Huge Monstrous Mistakes again. And edit, of course. That too. Also cry. I suspect there will be a lot of crying involved. *curses at Marcus*

So, what comes next? Several ideas. My current projects include updating the Tales from Liserna covers to match the style of the Tales of Esper Ravenwood ones, more stories for the Lazarus Anthology, actual art for the cover of the book I just wrote because that’s a good idea, and a read-through of All’s Well in Asgard.

Actually, I might do something different with that last one. The “reality” parts of All’s Well in Asgard are really boring, and not really the story I want to be telling. The fantasy bits, on the other hand, are basically what I tried to do with another project, that has long since bit the big one, but in a way that actually works, and feels like a complete story, even though it’s only 26k or thereabouts. I may end up renaming the project to Charge, which was the title for the bit-dust project, and make it into a graphic novel/comic. It’s a story that would work quite well with the medium, and put a challenge on me that I might actually be able to complete this time.

As for non-book projects, I’m working on, of all things, developing a tabletop game with some friends of mine for the Three of Wands RPG Company. I’m currently the one spearheading the project, as it were, and thus far have the only testable prototype. I work smart. I’ll probably be running that into the ground for a while, which should sufficiently take my mind off of the Chronicles. Should be a good time!

So that’s where I’m at. Tomorrow, I will be a very confused hermit because I won’t be writing a book. Oh…wait. I’ve still got New World to plan. *evil hand wringing*

See you soon!
-E.J. Lowell

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NaNo Update – Halfway There

Hello, friends!

I’ve never written a story this fast before. It’s terrifying. I just hit 30,000 words and am on Chapter 7 now. Those of you who’ve read my other books know that I tend to write long chapters. My average is 11 per book, with my longest so far(in terms of numbers of chapters) being Winterdream. Old World will end up being 12 chapters long, and possibly something like 60,000 words by the end of everything, which would make it my longest book yet, other than Revenant.

And I’m only on day nine. How am I doing this?

Whatever. Keep rolling, Ej! And the rest of you, too. We’ve got worlds to explore!

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NaNo Week 1 Update

Hello, friends!

So far so good! I’m a week in and already almost to 25,000 words(which is a higher word count than my dad has right at the moment. Didn’t expect this at all). I probably won’t end up with that by the end of the day, but maybe tomorrow. I’ve got a distraction today that I really wish I didn’t, but do I wish that because it’s not worth it, or because it’s dragging me out of my house while I’d rather be home writing and drawing? Remains to be seen.

Old World is writing itself in a blaze of creative glory, much like Revenant did. It’s rather refreshing, actually. It’s all planned out and is following the path in a gently meandering way…right up until the wall smacked everyone in the face. I’ve just gotten past the first earth-shattering ka-boom and it was awesome. If draining.

I’m learning a lot about this world and the characters in it that I didn’t realize in planning. They keep writing in little bits about themselves, like Kisuke spontaneously becoming a lore-nerd, and Marcus swearing in Abyssal. Evaline is still a little bit of a mystery, but she’s one of those characters that I know is going to bloom majestically when she gets into serious trouble. Ivan Valenshine is a bit of a surprise, though. He’s much more involved and sarcastic than he was when I first “met” him, and he and Evaline get along weirdly well. Surprisingly, the hardest character to write so far is Queen Elenora. She was much more vivid in my mind, but perhaps that’s because the only chapters in which we get to see her so far are through Kisuke’s point of view.  I didn’t expect her to be the problem child, but, hey. There’s always one. Except for Winterdream. That entire team worked together like a well-oiled machine.

Here’s to the next week, and the next couple of chapters. Marcus is about to meet one of my favorite characters from the planning stage, and the world is about to be thrown into utter chaos. *evil cackling*

Catch you later. Keep going strong, fellow WriMos!
-E.J. Lowell