Category: Witches

What’s in a Name?

While endings may be my least favorite part of writing, the part I enjoy the most is naming my characters. Weird, I know. But I like coming up with the perfect name for each character, the name that just feels right. And I like names that have an appropriate meaning for that character, too, or at least have a meaning that’s somehow linked to the character. For example, I just finished naming the characters in the new DOTD story. My MC’s name is Acacia Fauve. She’s very standoffish and untrusting, and Acacia (well, Cacia, anyway) means thorny. She was also born in the jungle (which is an important part of the story), and Fauve means “wild and uninhibited.”

What’s your process for naming characters? I make a list of the characters I need names for, with a one- or two-word tag (i.e.: the princess). Then I brainstorm words that are linked to that character. These could be character traits, physical characteristics, or background info (like the jungle thing with Acacia). Then I go to a naming website, (I like BabyNames.com) and use the search function to find names that mean those things.

It’s not an exact science, but it works pretty well. Sometimes it even works after the fact. With my Witches story, I have a king named Vassilus. I have no idea where I got that name, but one day I was looking the name up. Apparently, it’s another form of the name Basil. Which means, yes indeed, king. How’s that for happy coincedence?

Another Year’s Goals

I don’t do “resolutions” per se, but I do set goals at the beginning of every year. I don’t always reach them, but I strive to do my best to get there. This year, I didn’t set a lot of goals. I know it’s going to be a busy year, what with finding a new job and continuing my back-to-school journey, so I didn’t want to over-reach myself and get distracted. That being said, here are my goals for the year:

1) Revise Chasing Shadows
2) Revise Witches
3) Complete the 2YN2 story (probably about 40k left to write)
4) Completely re-do and finish the sequel to Werewolves for Dummies
5) Do NaNo

As far as non-writing-related goals, I only have two:

6) Complete a half marathon (“complete” meaning some walking is okay)
7) Carry a 4.0 in school

Of course, “revise the zombie story” will hopefully be added in sometime this year. And I should mention that the NaNo story will probably be something new and completely different…NOT a sequel to anything else. I have some ideas percolating…I can feel them. I’m currently querying Werewolves for Dummies, and I’ll start querying Chasing Shadows when I’m done revising it, as well.

So, yeah, those are all my goals for the years. Anyone else setting any for the year?

Loose Ends

The first draft of the Witches sequel is done! It comes in at 135k, which is less than half the word count of the first draft of Witches. It even has a title: Shadows of Winter. The title came to me a couple of days ago, like a bolt from the blue. No, Witches still doesn’t have a title, although I’m getting glimmers of an idea in that direction. I try not to push it. It will give me its name when it wants to, sort of like my characters do. I also finished up the first draft of the werewolf story last week. I had computer issues with it that meant I lost about 15k of it, but since I was aware that the story had some issues in the front end, I decided not to worry about that (not that worrying would have done me any good at all anyway), and just put in quick and dirty summaries for the last chapters, since I know good and well there are going to be major changes made during the revision. It’s all good.

So, that leaves getting ready for NaNo as my only loose end. With two weeks left, there’s plenty of time. Except that for seven of those days, I’m gong to be out of town, and for three days before that, I’ll need to be getting ready to leave. So, that really only gives me three days to finish my outline and get everything ready for the madness. No sweat, right? Right. Ah…Need to go look at that outline again. I think I have, oh, the first chapter planned. But I do have some really nasty things in mind to inflict upon my characters…If they’d just finish telling me their names, this would be so much easier!

Done!

With this draft of Witches. Finally. It comes in at 188k. Which, considering the original draft was 297k, doesn’t sound so bad. I know I need to cut quite a bit more, but right now, I’m letting it sit and breathe. I’m hoping to do a novel swap with it, but I’m not in any great hurry. It’s also going through my crit group, and I have no intentions of subbing it anytime soon.

Now that this draft of Witches is done, I can work on some other things. Like finishing the sequel, which is probably about 2/3rds done. And considering I haven’t written anything new in over a month, that should be interesting, getting back into the swing of things.

I’m also working on my query letter for the 2YN story. I hate writing queries, but I’m determined to come up with a good one for this story. I also plan on going through the MS one more time to make sure everything’s cleaned up and pretty, then I’m going to start subbing it. Nervous about that, but it’s time that story left the nest.

But for now, let me just say again: I’m DONE!

Standing On The Edge

I’ve been editing Witches like mad for the past two months. Mad, I tell you. Until some days I just wanted to strangle my characters, or merely use some transparent act of God to kill them all off at once so they wouldn’t make my head hurt anymore. Don’t get me wrong. I love this story. Love it. However, it’s been running around in my brain, in some form or another, for almost ten years. That hurts just to type those words. Ten. Years. So, I think I can be forgiven for getting a little tired of the story. Only occasionally, mind you, as I haven’t been working on it continuously for ten years. Far from it. The original first draft ended at around 297,000 words. Yes. Far too long. The second draft was about 50k shorter. I’ve mostly finished the current editing pass, and it’s sitting at 197k. So, all in all, I’ve cut 100k from the story. Yeah. I’ve cut, in essence, an entire book from this story, and I know I still need to cut at least 50k. I have about eight more chapters to re-visit, all of which I marked in my notes as possible cuts. When I finish that, I’m going to put this story aside for a while and let it breath.

But you know what? I still love these characters. They don’t bore me. They pop into my head at unexpected moments. I still can’t wait to see what happens to them. I think that’s a good sign. Heck, a lot of the real people I know have more than started to bore me after I knew them for ten years. But not my characters. So up next, when I finish the little bit of clean-up I have left on this draft, I’m going to finish writing the sequel to Witches. And I know, the draft of that story won’t be anywhere near as long as the first draft of Witches.

All in all, I’ll be happy to put Witches aside. For now.

Killing My Darlings

I’ve spent most of the day editing. About ten hours. I know this draft of Witches is WAY too long, and I know I rambled on a bit, seeing as how it was the first thing I ever really tried to write (and I lost my way several times), but it still sucks when I have to take out scenes that I love. I hate doing that, even when I know the entire scene (chapter, really) was pointless in terms of the story, except to illustrate the sheer volatile nature of Kahleena’s relationship with Julien. But still. Hard to cut it. Of course, I stuck it in the file I keep for everything I’ve cut from this story. Hey, if it ever gets published, I can do something with the deleted scenes, right?

Of course, I wrote much of Witches without an outline. Now that I’ve learned the folly of that (for me personally, anyway), I’m hoping to avoid any more purely indulgent scenes. And not have to cut half the MS to get it to the outer reaches of publishing length. Here’s hoping the editing goes well tomorrow, though I won’t spend nearly so long at it.

The Prodigal Returns

No, I haven’t actually dropped off the face of the planet. Not that there’s been much evidence to the contrary around here…I’ve been busy. Yeah. That’s it. Busy. Sort of. Or lazy, whichever word you prefer (although the second is probably much nearer the actual truth). Work’s been pretty busy lately, and I’ve been out of town, too, so that’s two excuses I’m using.

I’ve been doing quite a bit of editing on Witches. I’m a little past the halfway point in this pass, and of course, editing eats my brain, so it’s a slow go most of the time. At this point, I’m looking forward to finishing this pass and putting it away for a while.

My crit group has two new members, and is a lot more active lately, so that’s been taking more of my time than it has in roughly a year. It’s all good, though. We needed the new blood, and they seem to be a good fit. They’ve both done really useful crits on my latest chapter, and I’m looking forward to getting into both of their stories.

I haven’t done any writing this month. At all. Might possibly explain my less-than-sunny attitude of late. (Actually, it probably does. I’m always much happier when I’m writing something. Guess that’s a sure sign I was meant to be a writer, huh? Maybe not a good one, but a writer nevertheless.) I’m hoping to get at least a few thousand words in this week so the month won’t be a total bust on the writing front. I think I needed the break from my over-achieving madness, but I can feel the stories starting to nibble at the edge of my brain again. Not to mention that I’m playing catch-up on the HTTS lessons, and that story is starting to take shape as well. Like I need another story in the queue for this year.

Actually, the main reason I haven’t been around lately is that I got sucked into Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander books. Completely consumed. To the point that I find myself talking with a Scottish accent (But only in my head. So far, I’ve managed to keep it from being out loud. The talking-to-myself-in-my-head thing is totally normal for me. I swear.) I absolutely love these books. The world is so realistic I feel like I’m there. I love Jaime and Claire. I think they’re great characters, and so lifelike I feel like I know them. (And, incidentally, could I get a Jaime for myself, please?) I love big books that let me sink into them, and I’ve been totally immersed for the last several weeks, to the point of staying up ’til 3 a.m. on a day I have to work because I had to find out what happens! I just wish I’d read the books before Conestoga last July, when Diana Gabaldon was the Guest of Honor. I did go to several panels she was on, and was very intrigued by her, but I probably would have gotten a lot more out of it if I’d read the series first. Love them. Can’t wait ’til September when the next one comes out. And, strangely enough, I’ve seen three people in the last couple of weeks who have been reading one of the books. Go figure. I’m surrounded.

So, that’s the reason I haven’t been around. I’ve been in Scotland (I wish), and in the 1700s. Good reason, no? But I finished A Breath of Snow and Ashes today (at about 2 a.m.), so I have absolutely no excuses for slacking off. (Like I need an excuse.)

Why, No, I Don’t Have A Life Outside Of Writing (Why Do You Ask)?

And the results for the first week of June are….Success! Well, partial success, anyway. I hit all my word count goals for the week, in all four stories. The zombie story is going, and that’s about all I can say about that. The sequel to Witches is coming along quite well, and staying mostly true to the outline. The werewolf story is flowing very well, and I have the next two or three scenes outlined (and by “outlined”, I mean I have one sentence for each scene). I started writing the sequel to the 2YN story this weekend. It’s flying along surprisingly well, especially considering I outlined the first two chapters only, and hey, finished those this weekend. Looks like there’s some more outlining in my near future…

The editing? Didn’t go so well. I did get about five chapters edited in Witches. Sigh. It needs a lot of editing. Right now, I’m going through back crits from SG, and seeing what I agree with. Most of the crits are spot-on, and the changes make the story much stronger. So, now all I have to do is follow up with those changes through the rest of the story. Didn’t even get started editing Tempest, but I’ll catch up on that. I’m going to try to re-do the outline for that story before I edit, to help keep me in line. Here are my approximate word counts for the week:

Zombie story: 1,500
Werewolf story: 5,500
Witches sequel: 4,000
2YN sequel: 5,500
Editing: 10,000

May Madness

I knew at the beginning of the year when I set my personal goals that I was being overly ambitions. But it seemed doable. It still seems doable, although my brain does not seem to share my belief. For the last two weeks, I’ve written nothing. Nada. Zilch. On the upside, I did get the 2YN story edited. Again. And I’m happier with this draft. Hoping to start sending it out soon. It’s now tentatively titled Charming Dragons. I wrote about 37,000 words in the first two weeks of the month, so May wasn’t a total bust, but I’d hoped to finish the draft of the Witches sequel this month, and that didn’t happen. It didn’t even come close to happening.

However, I do have a spiffy new plan to finish writing the three stories I’m currently working on (zombie story, Witches sequel, werewolf story), by the end of August, along with the sequel to Charming Dragons. And edit Witches AND Tempest of Angels. So, clearly I haven’t passed the overly-ambitious part of the year yet. 🙂 I do have set word count goals every day, and certain days to work on certain stories. I’m hoping the juggling act will keep me from burning out on any one story. At least, that’s the plan.

Now I’m off to brainstorm the new story. Wish me luck!

Near Disaster

This was supposed to be a post about what I’ve been reading lately, but I think that will have to wait while I ramble on about something else: Yesterday, as I was working on the Witches sequel, my computer apparently took a dislike to the work and ate it. All 75,000 words of it. Gone. Not only did the computer close my Word program, it erased the entire document off of my thumb drive. It did do an AutoRecovery save at the last second, because I saw it before it vanished into the ether. So I didn’t panic. Then.

I opened up Word again. No message saying Word had saved the file I was working on and would I like to open it again? (Yes, please, I would have loved that. But no.) And that’s when I realized the draft was gone off my thumb drive as well. This is the point where I started to panic. I mean, I’ve been working on this story for two months, and this draft is scheduled to be finished this month, so that was a lot of work. I resisted the impulse to bang my head against the desk.

I checked the on-line help site, and came up with a whole list of things to try, including re-setting Word functions to recover a damaged file. No go. After two hours of this, I developed a headache (No, not from banging my head against the desk.), turned off the computer (a.k.a. “you piece of crap, give me back my story!) and retreated to regroup and take a nap. Which wasn’t very restful, let me tell you, since visions of re-writing all 300 pages kept flashing through my mind, along with a plan to get myself caught up on this by the end of the year while still accomplishing my other goals.

When I woke up, I took a deep breath, turned on the computer, and tried again. Three hours and countless document searches later, I finally found it. Well, most of it. I lost about 500 words, but really, in the scheme of things, what’s 500 words? It was stored in some temporary file somewhere, and I was so happy to see it that I could have kissed the screen.

Now, after my best friend had her hard drive crash a couple of months ago and lost everything, I made sure to save copies of all my drafts to my two e-mail storage accounts. Did I have a copy of the Witches II draft there? No. Of course not. Do I now? Definitely. So, the morale of this story is: 1) Always, always, always back up your work, and 2) Prayers to the computer gods sometimes get results.

In a slightly different writing-related-crash, Holly Lisle has a new website where she does Writing Crash Tests. You should check it out, and see what happens with the Case of the Exploding Cat.