I know I've been quiet in regards to my writing, but I have indeed been busy. I've just had nothing that's postable. The transcription of the Peter Beagle interview was finished early in the week, and I've been working on the Helix rewrite since then, as well as spending time on the Armadillocon Writers Workshop, which is coming up in just under two weeks. So, yeah, I'm not slacking.

Now Playing: Various The Best of Ravel

The break from Wetsilver is in full effect. I haven't looked at the novel since last Thursday, and won't again for at least another week. Since then, I've done some editor-requested tweaks to one story, looked at the bigger rewrite project for Helix with a mix of consternation and dread, and done a heck of a lot of transcribing on the Peter S. Beagle interview.

I'm quickly rediscovering one of the main reasons I stopped doing interviews. Transcribing the interviews are tedious and time-consuming. I've spent several hours on this thing already, and I'm not yet halfway finished. And that doesn't even take editing into consideration. Here's an interesting exchange we had, pauses and verbal placeholders cleaned up for clarity's sake:

You've said elsewhere that you aren't a particularly huge fan of unicorns. Do you ever feel like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? Has the unicorn become your own personal version of Sherlock Holmes?

It's not quite the same thing, although it's a legitimate question. One of my very favorite writers, James Stephens, got so tired of being known only for a very successful novel, The Crock of Gold--it overshadowed several other novels of his which were very good--that he just quit writing novels all together. He spent the last 25 years of his life writing poetry and broadcasting for the BBC, which I'm really sorry about, although he was a fine poet.

I know Conan Doyle came to hate Sherlock Holmes really acutely. He wrote historic fiction which he was very proud of, he wrote a lot of different stories set in different places. He wrote the Professor Challenger stories. And yet there was this goddamn Holmes that was all people wanted to hear about. Doyle really did make a serious effort to kill him off but he was pressured into bringing him back.

No, I don't feel like that about the unicorn at all. The Last Unicorn is dedicated to Robert Nathan, and Robert called me when he read the book. He said to me, "You're going to be stuck with this the way I'm stuck with Portrait of Jennie." Robert wrote close to 40 novels, and Portrait of Jennie is not the best one. But it was made into a movie with Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotten about 10 years after he'd written it and it's still considered a minor classic. Nathan said, "There are times when I hate that book, because it overshadowed so much better stuff I did--and I know I did better stuff. You'll do better stuff than The Last Unicorn. Other times I think of all the wonderful things that have happened to me because of Portrait of Jennie, and I know I can't possibly hate it. You'll go back and forth with the unicorn forever. That's just the way it is. There'll be people that know it and don't know that you ever wrote everything else. That's how it is. It's undoubtedly better to be remembered for one book than not remembered at all.”

So, it's a mixed bag kind of thing. It's opened doors, and it's given me generations of readers that I never imagined having. It was a nightmare to write, as I've told audiences often, and there are books like The Innkeeper's Song that matter more to me in a personal sense. In a way, I think of The Innkeeper's Song as my first grown-up book, and that's a personal meaning. I don't know how else to explain it.

So, no overwhelming compulsion to write "This Day All Unicorns Die"?

No, no nothing like that. I do, however, belong to a small, informal group dedicated to writing stories that have no bloody elves in them! That's another matter. The word we use isn't "bloody" either!

I should finish the transcription in another day or so, depending on how much time I'm able to devote to it. It's a good interview, a really good interview, and I'm looking foward to seeing it in final form.

Now Playing: Martin Hummel and Karl-Ernst Schroder 17th Century German Lute Songs

Wrote 600 words on Wetsilver last night, wrapping up chapter 10. I just discovered two new characters that I hadn't anticipated, who will be interesting supporting players the rest of the way. One, interestingly enough, is a composer in the mold of the great Viennese composers of the 17th-18th centuries. I certainly didn't see that coming.

32,750 / 90,000 (36.4%)

I had a section picked out to post here--in fact, I'm looking at it now--but I've decided not to. I'm not happy with it. I'm not happy with a lot of what I've written on the novel the last two weeks. The feeling's been growing steadily that this train jumped the tracks a ways back, and the increasing difficulty in writing anything that works has convinced me. When I'm in trouble with a story, my tendancy is to flail around, narratively speaking, writing and writing in the vaguely-realized hope of somehow finding the right path again and moving on.

That's not happening. Rediscovering the right path, I mean.

I've written some good stuff, don't get me wrong, but the whole is disjointed and inconsistent. Something's got to give. I just don't know what. It may be that I visualized the opening quarter of the book strongly, but my imagination and planning got fuzzy beyond that, and outlining would help. I'm not convinced on that count, though, since I already know what's coming next. It could be that I'm creatively drained on Wetsilver. I've been working on it steadily for two months without coming up for a breath (Apollocon excepted). I've never pushed myself that long and hard on any single project before, and coupled with the decline in sleep time, well, it's wearing and wearying. And that's certainly possible, although I have no valid personal comparisons for reference. It may simply be a case of all those minor errors and imperfections I noted in earlier chapters accumulating and developing enough gravitational mass to throw the plot off. Which is possible, as leaving trouble spots alone and pressing on isn't my normal mode of operation. I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to deal with the problem.

I don't want to step away from Wetsilver, because I'm more than a week behind my self-imposed schedule already. But I don't want to keep throwing good effort after bad, especially if it adds to my growing frustration. I may put it aside for a week or two, let it lay fallow so I can develop a clearer perspective on what's going wrong. I do, after all, have plenty of other projects that could fill the time--that Peter Beagle interview, a radio script I'm supposed to be writing with Mark Finn, a near-future short I've been discussing with Chris Nakashima-Brown, and two other short stories that would be offshoots of "Being an Account of the Final Voyage of La Riaza: A Circumstance in Eight Parts," which I recently sold to Interzone. And then there's that other rewrite I owe Helix. So, lots of stuff I need to do, and a Turkey City workshop coming up on the horizon.

I expect I'll at least tackle the Beagle interview, since although it's time-consuming, it is relatively stress-free. And there's a paycheck waiting for me on the other end of it. After that, I've no idea. But happily, I've fallen into a good rhythm of nightly work, so I will be productive. Just maybe not on Wetsilver.

Now Playing: Buffalo Springfield Retrospective

I sat down last night resigned to scratching out maybe a page worth of story, so imagine my surprise when I got rolling and ended up with 900 words--just short of my increasingly rarely-met nightly goal of 1,000. I stayed up somewhat later than usual in doing so, but I'm not hurting as badly this morning as I expected. And guess what? Jachym's finally in Rokanyky!

Ctibor turned them onto an avenue so wide it had a medium lined with winter-bare trees running down the middle. A band of two clarinets, a violin and bagpipes performed a whirling, bouncing tune on the edge of a park filled with naked trees and still-green bushes. A handful of people had gathered to watch, and passers by tossed coins into the upturned hat on the grass.

Jachym turned around to watch them as they passed. He'd never seen a band like that before. But then again, he'd seen more people in the past hour than he had in the entirety of his life up to that point.

"Nevermind that lot. They're just scroungers. Lucky they even know which end to blow into. Where you're going, you'll be seeing real musicians soon enough," Ctibor said. "Turn around now, I want you to see this. You being desert-bred, this ought to be quite a sight for you."

The coach crossed onto a bridge as wide as the avenue. Trees continued to grow in the medium. Flanking the bridge on either side was a low, arched wall of gold-veined ivory marble. Upon this wall, evenly spaced, were elaborate sculptures of dozens upon dozens of women, each one double life size.

"This is the Nádherny Bridge, the largest in Rokanyky--and Rokanyky's got plenty of bridges to choose from," Ctibor said. "We're passing over the Trpytit se Jezero. Glitters like that year 'round, as long as the clouds hold back. The falls over the dam at the far end that are pretty impressive, too. You can get a good view of them from the barge docks."

"What--who--are the statues?" Jachym asked. One woman stood proudly, holding a staff tipped with a znak above her head. Another, leaning on a crutch and missing her right leg, reached out to children gathered about her.

"Those, young Jáhen, are the likenesses of every Mysl that ever was. There's 154 of them, if you care to count," Ctibor said. "The opposite side has statues of the Krev. There's 162 of those."

I also managed to work on that short story rewrite for a good bit last night as well, before I picked up Wetsilver. The rewrite's is something of a challenge, because the climactic scene must be dramatically rethought. I'm having to make some tough decisions with it, so my fingers are crossed that they'll be the correct ones.

32,000 / 90,000 (35.6%)

Now Playing: Sheena Easton No Strings

Only around 250 words went down on the page last night, and damned if I know why. This is one instance where I clearly saw what came next in the narrative, and even had fully formed snippets of dialogue forming amidst all that gray matter filling my head, but... The closest I can come to describing it is that the words didn't come out in the right order. Weird, I know. One character would say something. But he hadn't been established in the scene yet. So I had to work backwards and establish him. But then he was addressing something that hadn't been established yet, either. But addressing that issue disrupted the opening of the scene. I'm not allowing myself to be a perfectionist with this first draft, but the prose has to at least be coherent enough for me to understand when I come back through later to fix it. I'll tell you, last night was downright maddening. Hopefully tonight will be an improvement.

31,050 / 90,000 (34.5%)

Now Playing: Aerosmith Greatest Hits

I suppose I ought to post my writing progress from last night, lest you folks think I'm slacking. Only about 500 words, but that's not bad considering I didn't get to sit down and work until 11 p.m. or so.

"They killed them all?"

Vondra nodded solemnly. "All of them in the Great Církev. Between Vladislav's betrayal of the true Strelecs, and the confrontation with Mysl Agáta... a single day was all it took to end the line of Strelecs, unbroken since the time of Gert. Eighty-three men died, both true and apostate. Maybe half that number were away in other cities, plotting other blasphemy. The Warrant of Apostasy fell on these, too. When Tvůrce withdrew his Blood Gift, they fled civilized lands. Few were ever seen again."

Jachym thought for a moment. "Were you... were you in the Great Církev with the Mysl?"

Vondra laughed loudly. "I look that old to you? Oh, Jachym, my vanity'll never be a problem with you around!"

Jachym reddened, ducking his head.

Vondra touched his hand gently. "Jachym, no. You didn't offend. I love your innocent honesty."

He tensed at her words.

"No, I wasn't there. The Schism happened ten years before my time. There are a handful of Tsukrs and Knězka who witnessed those days, but they're very few these days. And the Knez are fewer still. They are old men, Jachym, most older than your Knez Borivoj, and when they die there will be no more."

I'm worried that most of this chapter will ultimately end up in the Big Info Dump In The Sky. There's lots of explanation on parade, but more cryptic questions will manifest shortly. Ah well, that's what first drafts are for, right?

30,800 / 90,000 (34.2%)

Now Playing: Patsy Cline 12 Greatest Hits

Zero words written on Wetsilver, but that's not indicative of a wasted night. I did get a pressing book review finished for SFSite.com. Also handled some other writing-related tasks that needed handling, as well as exchanging email with an editor who has some significant rewrite requests for a particular story of mine. So the long and short of it is that I had a productive night, but Wetsilver languished.

Oh, yeah. Then Calista started throwing up in the middle of the night, so I didn't get much sleep. The joys of fatherhood.

Now Playing: Cheap Trick Greatest Hits

Despite unexpected company and an enormous load of distractions, I had a productive night of writing and have finally passed the one-third milestone. I actually made up a tiny bit of my wordage deficit, although I'm still 4,700 words short of where I need to be. After a disturbingly slow start, I fell into a pretty good rhythm, and could've kept going for a while longer if I hadn't started nodding off. It was at that point I looked at the clock and realized it was 2 in the A.M. Suffice to say, I'm a wee bit punchy this morning.

After dinner, Jachym lay in his bed, wrapped in a warm quilt. Gauthier snored loudly across the room. Jachym stared at the ceiling, unable to sleep despite a full mug of beer and two bowls of barley soup. Sighing, he kicked off his covers and put on his bondsash.

"What're you doing?" mumbled Radek from the bed next to him.

"Gotta piss," said Jachym, slipping out the door.

He did have to piss, he realized as he walked down the hall. But he didn't want to go back and use the chamber pot where Radek and Gauthier could see. And it was too cold to go all the way out to the outbuilding. By way of compromise, Jachym opened the back door of the Kostel and pissed off the rear step. Looking at the muddy puddle he'd made, he made a mental note to watch his step in the morning.

I've mentioned before how this book keeps throwing surprises at me, and last night was no exception. I finished chapter 9 fully expecting chapter 10 to open with Jachym and the rest of Tsukr Vondra's party rolling into the great city of Rokanyky. Nope. Turns out they're stopping at some of the towns along the way for much-needed rest and good food leavened with infodump. Imagine that. And Tsukr Vondra is about hear some news of what's been going on in Rokanyky while she's been gone that she finds quite troubling.

30,300 / 90,000 (33.7%)

Now Playing: Three Dog Night Joy to the World: Their Greatest Hits

The postponed July 4 fireworks display was last night, so we took the girls out to watch and didn't get back to the house until after 10. Factor in the decompression, prepping the girls for bed, reading a chapter of The Last Unicorn in there, and I was too bushed to write anything. Which sucks. I'm more hopeful for tonight.

Since I don't have a chapter excerpt to post, I thought I'd comment on something I've been mulling over for quite a while now--mainly why I suspect earlier attempts at writing Wetsilver have failed (at least in part). Other than The Broken Balance, the epic first book of a high fantasy trilogy I wrote back in high school, all of my fiction has been of the short fiction variety. I hadn't realized it until fairly recently, but every time I've started a novel--yes, even The Broken Balance--I approached it as I would short fiction. That is, in my mind, each chapter was the equivalent of one short story. I don't know where this mindset came from, because I didn't read those famous "fix-up" SF novels from the '50s and '60s (Simak's City and the like) until college or thereafter. But that view was firmly entrenched.

Whenever I wrote a chapter, I built is as a self-contained story unto itself. There was a beginning, middle and end, even if said chapter didn't have narrative elements that lent themselves to this approach. The result was that I essentially encouraged potential readers to put the book down at every opportunity. "Oh, here's a good stopping place then. I'll go ahead and watch the nightly news then pick up again tomorrow." This is exactly the opposite effect a writer wants--the goal of a novel (one of the goals, at least) is to suck the reader into your fictional world and get them so engrossed that they don't want to leave. Showing them the door at every chapter break isn't the way to do this.

Now, I'm not saying I'm building in a cliffhanger at the end of each chapter. Well, there is one at the end of chapter 1, but that's a special case, right? What I am doing is ending each chapter with a little question, a little void of knowledge, something to provoke a sense of anticipation in the reader, a need to know "What comes next?" At least, that's my hope. I have no idea how successful I've been thus far, and undoubtably much will change in the second draft. But I'm pleased that even the evil, uncooperative chapter 9 end with a promise of Interesting Stuff that should pique the reader's interest. And I think the novel-in-progress is much stronger for it.

Now Playing: Various Celtic Moods

The foul beast, it is slain! After a thousand words written last night, the Chapter from Hell is over and done with. It took me almost two weeks to write the thing--including the time lost due to Armadillocon and prepping for the Peter Beagle interview--and it fought me every step of the way. I'm now almost exactly a week behind on my production schedule, and I don't know if that's deficit I'll be able to make up. The good news is that I shouldn't have nearly as much difficulty with this thing for the next half dozen chapters or so. Knock wood.

A full week after reaching the first road fort, Ctibor reined the coach to a halt in late afternoon. Snow fell steadily, as if it were determined to not let up until spring. The constant wind whipped it around into a pale fog. It was shin deep on the ground, but still light and powdery, easily passed through.

"What's wrong, Ctibor?" asked Vondra, opening the coach door.

"Nothing, Excellency," he answered, jumping down from the driver's seat. His boots left deep impressions in the snow. "I wanted the boys to see this."

Radek came out of the coach behind Vondra. Jachym and Gauthier--watching each other warily--climbed down from opposite sides.

"What do you see, boys? Tell me what you see out there."

Jachym peered into the distance. At first, all he saw was more of the irregular, white landscape he'd seen for the past few days. Then he realized part of it was darker than the rest. A wall--close, too. Less than a stone's throw ahead of them. It wasn't much--maybe the height of a man--but it stretched out of site in either direction, broken only by a gap directly ahead for the road to pass through.

"It's a wall."

"That it is," Ctibor said. "And do any of you know what's on the other side of it?"

Jachym, Radek and Gauthier looked at each other in bafflement, more concerned with keeping their feet moving to stay warm than the other side of a wall.

"You shouldn't try to be dramatic, Ctibor. You're not good at it. And definitely not in this kind of weather," Vondra said. "That's a wall of boundary, boys. On the other side is the Rokanyky basin. We've made it."

When I wrap this novel up--late September is still my target date--there's going to he a whole heck of a lot of rewriting and revisioning left to do before Wetsilver is in anything close to coherent form. And chapter 9 is at the top of my list for wholesale slash-and-burn editing. When the whole thing is finished, I'm pretty sure I'll have a better overall vision of the story and a clear idea of how to make trouble spots like chapter 9 contribute more effectively to the overall narrative. At least, that's what I'm telling myself.

29,000 / 90,000 (32.2%)

Now Playing: Don Henley California Desperados

Wrote 600 words last night, give or take. They were nowhere near as sucky as those from the previous night. That, or the beer was clouding my judgement. Fingers crossed that I can finish up the Chapter From Hell tonight and get on with the rest of the book. That's my plan and I'm sticking to it.

Oh yeah. Happy 4th of July, everyone! We're in the middle of a sizeable thunderstorm, so it looks like the city's fireworks display is gonna be a washout.

27,850 / 90,000 (30.9%)

Now Playing: Leroy & Stitch

Two hours and only 250 words to show for it. Ouch. And I'm not happy with any of those 250 words, either. This chapter's doing its damnedest to derail the whole book. Tonight I'm going to try a different tact. Goodness knows it can't be any less effective than what I've been doing.

27,250 / 90,000 (30.3%)

Now Playing: Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1