I’ve been thinking about Zelda and James, and I realized that I have once again committed the same mistake I always make: I’ve given them negative goals. It’s all the more galling since we were just talking about this on CherryForums and I did a huge post on it. And then I rewrote [...]

I went over James’s first scene one more time, this time on paper (I went over all of Act One on paper because once you print it out it looks entirely different and you find things you’d missed before, and yes, I’ll fix the dates, I swear) and the first chapter rose from 6880 to [...]

So I just cut James’s introductory scene stuff from 7,225 words to 2,816. Which was still three hundred words too many. Scylla’s scene was 2242, so it was already short, but I cut it to 1988 anyway because once you get cutting, it doesn’t hurt that much. That put the first chapter [...]

One of the hardest things about writing is keeping the outside out of your head. When you’re writing and the story is in there so strong and you’re going ninety miles an hour, and then the phone rings and you answer it and it’s somebody foisting their wing-nutted-ness on you and suddenly the outside’s [...]

I’m still cutting James’s scene, but Zelda’s is first draft done, until I get the whole book done and come back and write it again, but definitely enough to anchor the beginning of the book. It’s too dialogue heavy still, so some of that will go to put more physical cues on the page, but [...]

For those who asked, I can’t talk about the Fun Book, it’s still in the squishy stage when it has to be just me. I wouldn’t have brought it up here except that it’s taking time away from You Again and that’s what the Twelve Days are about, what happens as I try to [...]

The new first scene really is much better. It’s still not tight enough and I have to concentrate on the characters more so it’s not so much information swapping and is really conflict. I did another polish on it today and it’s still not where it should be, but I’m happy with [...]

I was supposed to be working today, and instead I caught up on all the back episodes of Heroes. People kept telling me it was wonderful and I kept saying, “I have no time, I must write,” and then my brains dribbled out my ears because all I did was write. [...]

I now have all the pieces of You Again separated into different scene files and stashed in Act Folders and I know exactly why Jen said, “No,” and Bob screamed trying to fix it. It’s a puzzle that’s missing three quarters of its pieces and somebody lost the lid to the box with the [...]

I played hookey today and wrote 3500 words on my Fun Book, the one that’s not under contract and won’t be for months. I guess that’s Busman’s Hookey, isn’t it? Shirking work to do work? But it’s so much fun to have a book I’m not talking about, one that I’m just [...]