Life
This month, we took a family road trip to visit my mother-in-law for Thanksgiving. My wife and I once again used our patented road trip strategy for managing our young children—we woke up early and left the house around 4 am. That way, our children sleep for a good few hours of the drive before they even know what’s going on. At the point where they start asking “are we there yet” (they’re officially in that phase now), we are only a couple hours away from our destination. While it isn’t fool-proof, it works well enough that we’ve used it for a few trips now and plan to continue using it as we’re able.
There was a round of sickness to go through the house, from which we have since recovered. We’ve definitely had worse, but I figure it bears mentioning.
I’ve been playing through Supergiant’s new(ish) roguelike game, “Hades”, which is remarkable not only for its fluid mechanics and fun gameplay, but for it’s incredible character writing. I actually got completely invested in the narrative, which is far from the norm in roguelikes. For anyone into that sort of thing, I’d give it a very emphatic “recommend”.
My attendance of chess club has suffered a bit this month, between the illness and the traveling, but I still hope to get back to it next month.
Writing
Well I didn’t do the map. I know, I know. I’m the worst.
But I did finish the draft.
As it goes with revision passes, I didn’t feel a great sense of accomplishment when I completed it, as so many things obviously need to be done with the next few passes, but what I set out to do with this one was done, so that’s… well, it’s something.
In more exciting news, I’ve begun drafting something! (Sort of.) As some of you may know, I drafted the first installment of my steampunk epic fantasy series The Shattered Heavens at the beginning of this year. While I was pretty happy with how most of the POV characters turned out, one of the five ended up having some pretty major plotting issues that I didn’t really come to grips with until the end of the draft. She needed a rewrite ASAP, but at the time I wasn’t ready to do it yet.
Well, I have arbitrarily decided that now is the time. I’m trying a unique approach to this ‘revision’, which I hope will help me conceptualize multi-POV novels better moving forward. While the characters do intersect each others’ stories throughout the plot, in most ways they should each stand on their own. In this way, you could consider the whole book as functionally similar to 5 intersecting novellas.
I decided to use this to my advantage in my revision of this character’s story. Treating her narrative as if it were a standalone novella, I reoutlined the plot, making sure to include the important intersections with the other characters. A few scenes and fragments are being salvaged from the original draft, but to a large extent I am starting fresh for this character and getting the chance to do her story justice this time. The way I see it, if I can get this part hammered out, then next year when I go to revision for the whole draft, I will have at least a few of the large-scale issues already solved.
Here’s a pitch on the novella’s plot:
Crushed by debt to a powerful corporation, the crew of the freelance airship, the Grim Pact, must embark on a dangerous mission to steal a secret weapon out from under the noses of their creditor’s greatest enemy.
The goal right now is to finish this novella by the end of December, which should (in theory) give me enough time for another quick pass on The Damned Earth in January, squeaking it in just before Baby #3’s due date at the end of that month. It’s a perfect plan, really. Nothing could possibly go wrong.
As always, thanks for reading.
Sincerely,
L.A.
I love this Luke! I’m excited to see what the future brings. I enjoy hearing about the process and the ups and downs of creative entrepreneurial pursuits! Love you and proud of you.