Some OOC sharing

[Kalthandrix]

Hey all.

 

I just thought I would share with you all my bubbling excitement from my RL. As some of you may or may not know, I have been away for a bit, working on..well work and life and all that, but I have also been working on writing my first novel. Well, it is not finished yet, but I am just about across the 100,000 word count and closing in on completing the first draft of it before my birthday in August.

 

I have a ways to go still, something like another 30-40,000 words or so I think, but I have been making some great progress and thought I would share.

 

:)

[Elgee]

That's great news! Have you found a publisher yet?

[Jehaine]

Oh dear, people are going to ask for cameos now...

 

Sillyness aside, what's it about?

[Kalthandrix]

No, no publisher or agent yet. I will have to save the hunt for either until I have the manuscript polished enough so that it shines.

 

As for what it is about...well, the story revolves around four main characters. Phnor is a grizzled former champion and an Arma of the Sword Rings (arma means weapon and is like a blademaster of the highest order). He wants the Seven Gods of the Unity (major religion) to pay for his wife and baby daughter dying and will do anything to see that it happens before he dies. Then there is Princess Alycia. She has been promised to Prince Davoren of Valdesmere and believes that the wedding between their two countries would lead to disaster to her homeland, but no one else sees it the way she does. So she ran away from home in order to somehow uncover the truth or to at least find a way to stop the wedding without causing a war. With her comes Blayn, a magius and her sworn protector. Blayn is completely besotten with Alycia though he knows that she does not see it. He has listened to her and the reasoning she has put forth for why the marriage should not happen, and while he believes in her, he follows more because he wants to save her and hopes that she will see how deep his love runs. Finally, there is Prince Davoren. The Crown Prince of Valdesmere leads the hunt to bring Alycia home and her kidnappers (they assume Phnor and Blayn) to justice. Prince Davoren is not only a royal though, but also what I am loosely calling the "blessed" of the Unity - a high ranking priest that is greatly empowered by the Seven. He is honor bound to bring his future wife home, but he burns to exact revenge upon Phnor for killing his beloved swordsmaster years ago.

 

So we have love, revenge, grief, and duty all mixed into the pot driving these characters, but there are deeper currents that they do not even know about. They are riding to the Poisoned Lands to find answers, but it might turn out that they only discover more deadly questions...

 

Now there is obviously more going on than this, but I think this is a good distillation of the general plot and feel to the story.

 

And as for cameos...I had a friend agree to allow me to use something like his name in another story I wrote, but then he just complained and whined when he finally read the story and discovered that Onurb (that’s Bruno spelled backwards) ended up being captured and beaten to death by my rather emo assassin that I wrote for a different setting...

 

 

[Elgee]

That sounds very interesting, Kal! Hope we get to read the whole story in book form one day  :D

[Sieve]

That tsound great, good luck with it!

[Jehaine]

Sounds great, agreed ^^

[Sieve]

That tsound great, good luck with it!

or sounds great even!

[Kalthandrix]

Thanks for the wonderful support everyone! I really want to make a living as a writer, but have honestly only been at it for less than two years when it is all said and done and have next to no kind of formal writing training. But then again, a lot of writers start out this way so maybe I will make some of my own success yet.

 

Most of the novel I am writing now is still in longhand - yeap hand written!, but David Eddids always wrote his manuscripes out longhand too from what I have read about the man. I have some stuff typed and edited a bit, but it is not really finished material. I think it is pretty god though. If you are interested, I could post the doc of my first three or so chapters up somewhere so you could download and read it if you had the desire?

 

Let me know.

[Raeyn]

 

Hee... I tend to handwrite things myself, too.  It makes me feel more in touch with the creative process, which is dead important right now - the pregnancy hormones are just destroying my brain.  Of course, I'm still not managing to write much... >__<

 

But definitely best of luck with this first book, and it sounds like an interesting premise!

[Arani Lepenque Aes Sedai]

I think I like it but I'm not too sure now because my tummy's feeling odd.

[Eqwina]

You are a man after my own heart. *eyes her DM friends* Some of them know that often I hand write my RP's before I type them. as Raeyn said I feel more intouch. I am also hoping to be a writer. I do not think I am good enough to make a living at it....yet, but I do love it.

 

Much of my notes are taken in notebooks and I only have the character bios on the computer.  ;D So it is not a strange way to write at all  8)

[Kalthandrix]

All of my posts are written out on these little message boxes, though I do copy/paste them into Word to do a quick spellcheck, but except for that they are all first draft as it were.

 

As for me writing out my novel longhand, it is more common for first time writers working on their first book, or at least that is what I have found from talking to people. But most of the professional authors don't do it this way. Kevin J. Anderson dictates his scenes into a recorder when he goes on walks and then has someone type them, or so I've read in his blog. And I believe Stephen King and RA Slavator both wrote out their first novels longhand as well.

[Eqwina]

Wow, so apparently it is fairly common at least at first.

[Jehaine]

I write my posts in the fast reply box, do a quick check to see if any typos sneaked in, and then post them.

 

Blame school. My longhand writing is slow, always has been, and making a draft during a test meant i didn't have enough time remaining to finish the good looking version. A habit out of necessity, so to speak :)