Tag Archives: Goddess’s Honor series

And…Beyond Honor is done!

Just typed THE END on the first draft of Beyond Honor today. It comes in at about 44,000 words, and didn’t quite end where I anticipated it. I suspect rewrites may blow it up to about 50k, but we shall see how that goes. The last segment was a lot longer than I expected, with Alicira and the god Staul throwing chips to determine what would happen with her, her child, and her magic. That ended up being one heck of a talky session, but there were some mouthy characters who needed to say their piece.

I already know I have continuity things to fix. However I pretty much know what they are, especially if I work backward from the end to lay the breadcrumbs for the finish.

Whew. As I said before, this was a story that was over forty years in the making. I first thought of the Goddess’s Honor world when I was fourteen, and had started wrestling with this aspect of the story in a writers group twenty-five years ago. Back then it wouldn’t have worked as conceived, but without that foundation I don’t think I could have taken the framework in hand and shaped it into the story I finished today.

Now to do other stuff, and tomorrow I start doing something about the short story inventory, which is pathetic, sad, and in need of growth.

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Progress on Beyond Honor

I’m closing in on the finish of Beyond Honor. Gods, this has been a difficult novella to write. Geez, how many years have I been struggling to write this portion of the whole Goddess’s Honor mythos? Thirty, maybe?

For whatever reason, each time I’ve started to write about how Alicira comes to Keldara has been a struggle. It was actually easier to write Pledges of Honor as an indirect approach to the whole mythos through an apparently unrelated character…except then it turns out that Katerin is related. Some of this is due to a bit of stereotypic conflict building. Alicira was abused by the usurper Zauril, with the explicit intention on his part of using her magic to advance his own power to elevate himself to godhood. She escapes, but she’s pregnant with his child. Trying to write her as a powerful character with agency even when all her options are narrowing and she has little choice has been the struggle.

And then there’s the magic. BIG SIGH. One effect of the growth of gaming these days, especially for a non-gaming writer like me, is trying to figure out a magical system that holds together and makes sense. I don’t think you can easily do a handwavium magic system any more, just because there are so many readers out there who build systems as part of their gaming. That’s a good thing, really, but it requires more work on the worldbuilding. So that means figuring out the rules of the sort of magic that’s going on…which is part of the ongoing struggle with this story.

Following that is the meshing of Alicira, Heinmyets, and Inharise as a family triad who shares leadership and magic.

All of this is to say that this book is going to need some massive rewrite, I suspect. But at least I’ve laid down the bones. Much as I’d like to get it out by May, I don’t know that I can do it. On the other hand, as I work through the elements in this book, it will make working on the next book simpler.

At least that’s what I hope.

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And…roadblocks, but in a good way

So it looks like Beyond Honor will need to be pushed back to March before it comes out. This is really a good thing/bad thing issue.

Bad Thing:

I was tired out after the week of Day Jobbe work, and that led to me developing a bug which slowed me down as it came on during Radcon. I really didn’t think I was sick until I was back home on Sunday, and even then I wondered if it wasn’t just allergies. Well, the next few days kinda told the story. I was flat on my back with a nasty chest/sinus cold but it’s fading. However, today I was still brain-fried and not able to get work done. I suspect the bug came from exposure to kids because I’ve not been sick for two years, and then bam! First exposure in a week of working in school settings, and it nails me. Not surprising, and I’m really glad I got the flu shot last fall as a result, because I think things could have been much worse. This also means that I’ve fallen behind in my online coursework, which needs to be done so I can renew my license, so…not a lot of action happening very quickly on writing as a result, especially since I need to do my final tax work for the tax preparer (AKA, dear hubby).

Good Thing:

A second short-term gig MAY be happening. If it does happen, that doubles the income from the first gig. Good news and this may allow me to finance covers and some other necessary self-promotion things. We shall see.

Meanwhile, being sick in the Enterprise house has its benefits. For one, for the first time in years I have a bedroom window that I can look out of. I retreated to the bed, opened the curtains, and watched the sky when I wasn’t reading or napping. It’s not the greatest view in the world, but given the choice between a mountain view in the living room and a mountain view in the bedroom? I’ll take the living room view any day. Watching the clouds also helped me gain a perspective on the cloud movement locally, which is something I’m still figuring out.

Meanwhile, Radcon was much fun and I came back with good ideas for short stories. I’m still tossing novel thoughts around, especially given what has happened given the difference in sales between Netwalk’s Children and Pledges of Honor. Pledges seems to have a consistent amount of sales while poor Children isn’t doing much. Now Frog Jones did give me a good keyword for the Netwalk Sequence–cyberpunk regency–so we’ll see how that works. Children also just plain needs a new cover. I plan to do something about it but it’s not a major priority at the moment.

But three days of being knocked off my feet sick plus a fourth of wandering around recovering doesn’t help anything. I have a lot of stuff to catch up on, plus…the horse needs work.

Seriously. Mocha is going through the winter with flying colors. She is fat–healthy fat, not obese. No ribs visible, even after a ride with the hair slicked down. She looks good. She only gets minimal grain when she’s caught up and ridden, and she’s very energetic. Today, I rode her back and forth along one side of the 40 acre pasture (roughly square) at a long trot for 3 1/2 lengths, in a wet, soggy pasture with no snow. She snuck a few strides of canter here and there into the trot, and was very eager to go. She is a relaxed and happy horse–but wants to run. I need to get my act together and haul her to an indoor so we can do some canter work once a week, because she’s mentally ready for it and she wants to go. Plus I am not entirely certain she is 100% sound. When I stretch her right foreleg, I hear snaps, crackles, and pops. She goes well enough on an uneven footing, but if I asked for more? I don’t know. At the least, she’s trail sound if not show sound. Mentally, she’s much happier than she’s been for several years. A winter spent doing mostly walk work in snow has given her a good foundation. She’s even more sure-footed than she was before, after a winter spent at pasture in snow. I watched her lope across the field to rejoin her best friend and she’d probably be fine loping under saddle in the pasture, but I’m not thoroughly confident about it yet.

So…onward. We’ll see how things shake out.

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Work, Beyond Honor, and thinking about Netwalking Space

So. I can haz part-time Day Jobbe. I got a call from the former employer because they got (temporarily) overloaded with kids who needed special ed testing. As it turned out, their timing fit my timing, so for the next 2-3 months I’ll be doing some work for them as a substitute for about a week or so each month. It’s nice getting back into harness, at least for a limited taste of it, but damn. Either I’m really rusty or else the stuff does take longer to do. It also leaves me mentally tired at the end of the day, so the writing has chugged to a slower pace. I don’t think this is reflective of how things will be in the future, though. I’m already contemplating strategies so I should be able to keep writing while working.

As a result of figuring out the processes now, though, the writing of Beyond Honor has slowed down. On the other hand, this is a good thing. I’m having to think very hard about how I bring Inharise, Heinmyets, and Alicira together. Right now I’m thinking it is Inharise who takes the lead, and so I’m considering how she manifests her magic. I’m happy with how it twisted and turned up to the point where I left off due to work sucking up my brain, though, so that is good.

I’ve also been thinking about the last Netwalk Sequence book, Netwalking Space. I suspect I’m going to be using flashbacks to Sarah’s secret and how it ties into the shadows at the heart of the Gizmo. To some degree, too, I think I’m getting a better grasp of the reasoning and the thought patterns of the Freedom Army, thanks to all the sovereign citizen information coming out in the wake of Malheur. That’s the mentality I want for the Army, and some of Sarah’s past history. But I’m postulating that the Army somehow made common cause with the Gizmo, and bringing out that history will also open up some of Sarah’s past ties, as well as the nature of the Gizmo.

So one of the threads will be What does the Gizmo really want? Why is it here?

Another element is going to be Melanie faltering and Bess picking up the pieces. Even ten years after Marty’s death, Melanie’s still reacting to it. The nature of his death gnaws at her on the tenth anniversary and she still questions why. Bess is forging her own way, but what she wants is not what Melanie wants.

And wherever Bess goes, Alex goes. He’s an enigma in his own right…son of Melanie’s first lover, grandson of Sarah’s long-term lover, lost to the Freedom Army at an early age. What pieces of Sarah’s history intersect and shape the role that he plays in the events of Netwalking Space, and how does he overcome his own shadowed history? How much of what he deals with affects his brother Don? And what would the Army do to get Alex and Don back in their fold?

How do these revelations impact Bess’s cousins Rick and Chris? What role do they play in the unfolding events, and what does the Gizmo want from them? To what degree do the bonds built through involvement in a creche cohort hold them together, even though Rick and Chris’s connections are shallower than the others due to not becoming part of it until their teen years?

So yeah. Things are ticking. I also need to knock off some new short stories on spec as well as possible anthologies. I think that might take a priority after I wrap up Beyond Honor, then go on to Netwalking Space and then Challenges to Honor.

Busy times, busy times. There’s also some other stuff in the fire right now that I can’t talk about yet, not until things get further along. And now I’d better get to it. This morning I hope to have the boys busy and out of my face as I write.

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Today’s Beyond Honor snippet

She didn’t know what woke her first, an overwhelming sense of wrongness from Narasin or Heinmyets’s yell. Alicira rolled, fumbling for bow and arrows and sword, heart pounding.

“Stop.” Inharise seized her wrists.

“Can’t you feel it? The Shadowwalkers are coming!” she screamed back, Heinmyets’s bellows amplifying Narasin’s danger. Danger. Danger.

“Stop it!” Alame yelled. “Alicira, release!” He took both of Heinmyets’s hands. “He doesn’t have control of the magic. You need to channel Narasin!”

Danger almost drove her to try to break through Inharise’s restraint. But there was something else, a sense of waters flowing around Alicira as she met the other woman’s eyes.

“You have to control it,” Inharise breathed. “He wasn’t like this before.”

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Get it while you can…

I’m publishing sections of Beyond Honor over at Kindle’s Write On boards. It’s not betaed or edited yet so you get to see what my rough draft processes look like, warts and all. I don’t even have chapter divisions done yet so this is REALLY rough stuff.

Come check it out here.

 

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Whew. Webpage updated

I’ve slowly been working on updating my web page over the past week and–whew–it’s finally DONE. I changed the theme, added pages including one for the Goddess’s Honor series, a page for anthology appearances, and updated my bibliography and the Netwalk Sequence page. Now it looks somewhat respectable–I think. Perhaps not as good as it would if I hired someone to design it, but right now, the publishing budget just doesn’t allow for design. So I’ve simplified the navigation and things should be reasonable to find…now. For whatever reason, this blog shows up as the front page, which is okay, really. In any case, I can cross “update the webpage” off of the list of things to do for this month.

Dang. Besides that, I also put down another 1,000 words on Beyond Honor and started revising “Glorianna.” That short story is getting thoroughly overhauled, including a change from first person to third person. So far it reads better. Add in some errands around the house involved with unpacking and putting things up on the walls, as well as a quick run out to the barn to check on a horse for the barn owner…and it’s been a busy day here in Enterprise.

Now it’s time to go relax.

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Beyond Honor and Glorianna

I’m really pleased that Beyond Honor continues to flow so well. Threads I hadn’t expected to unfold are starting to unfurl and help explain stuff I put in earlier in the book.

Love it when the subconscious has been working on the story for certain. I think one reason things are flowing well at the moment is that I am not trying to force massive words; instead, I’m just shooting for around 1,000 words a day. Considering I am also taking a class where I have to write several essays plus I have made a commitment to putting out new short stories and essays, that’s enough.

Right now, it’s working. The other project I’m working on is a significantly revised version of an older story for an anthology. I hadn’t looked at “Glorianna” for at least ten years, but pulling it out of the archive and dusting it off revealed the roots of a semi-decent tale–and I could also see where it failed. Lots of notes later, and I’m good.

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And a wee story twist….

Holy cremoly. Today’s work on Beyond Honor took a twist. A big twist that at first left me muttering because I was sure that led to a major continuity error in Pledges of Honor–and then I remembered that this was something Katerin would not have been exposed to or possibly even be aware of as a healer.

But yeah. Much more magic in this story than in Pledges. LOTS more.

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On the way through winter

I’ve kind of fallen behind on posting chapters for Netwalk’s Children and Pledges of Honor, but I have to wonder just how many people are seriously following along. It’s hard to say, but at least posting what I have has kept me going on the blog. It’s not that I don’t have things to write–I have lots–but between writing essays, taking a class, and doing stuff as well as keeping up with the horse, I find myself at the end of the day thinking that there’s things I should have been scribbling on the blog but haven’t. Oh well, that’s the way it flows.

The house in Enterprise is proving to be quite cozy. The other day I felt totally crappy and wanted to lie down and read. It was a snowy day, so I opened the bedroom curtains and lay in bed, read, and looked up to watch the measured drift of snowflakes. We’ve not had a heavy snow since mid-December, and temps have been hovering around freezing. Perfectly tropical. But we’ve been getting occasional snow showers, enough to keep the depth at about three inches here and close to a foot out in the pasture at the barn. It was quite comfy and cozy lying there and reading with snowflakes. Yeah.

I’ve called this place a hobbit house, and considering it’s kind of built into the hillside, yeah, I guess it is. In any case, even when the temps have been down around 0 F, we’ve kept warm with just our little soapstone wood stove. We let the fire burn down at night, but even in the 0s it doesn’t get cold enough for the furnace to kick in (set at 60). Guess the triple-paned windows and additional insulation makes a big difference, as well.

We have a handful of mule deer hanging around the house. Don’t see them every day, but often enough to know they’re our local crew. At least one is a little buck. When I saw him the other day he’d lost one antler. The muleys look good and healthy in this neighborhood, but a handful that hang out down the street look rough and not-so-good. The whitetails don’t appear to be quite as healthy as the muleys.

Then we had a flock of about twenty quail move through. They first clustered around the base of the pine tree, then found the grain I’d scattered for the birds and scratched it up quite effectively. Another big flock is hanging out at the barn. They’re awfully cute.

Mocha is wintering well. I think she’s continuing to put weight on. I can’t see ribs on her, even after riding with her coat packed down. The cold doesn’t appear to bother her, neither does getting damp. She’s looking relaxed and happy, and marches right out when I saddle her up for a ride in the snow. We’re talking about digging out the horse trailer and hauling her to an indoor arena once a week to start legging her up for spring riding. I just have to overcome my nerves about driving on packed snow and ice. Everyone else does it, so I just need to adapt as well.

I’m putting together some ideas for craft work. I’m not certain how well it will work but I’m going to be playing with things. I’ve also come across some inexpensive books and will be reviewing them.

Overall, we’re just having a quiet January. I have a nasty IBS flare popping up that apparently was triggered by drinking holiday dairy-free nog with stevia. Apparently stevia and I don’t get along. Who knew? I’m also taking an online class to renew my teaching license, putting together a memoir/Self-Publishing for Beginners course for the spring, and venturing into creative nonfiction. I’m also plugging away on the first draft of Beyond Honor.

Which, to follow that line–Pledges of Honor is selling well while Netwalk’s Children isn’t moving at all. Sigh. But yay. I knew that Pledges has a market. Non-European setting fantasy with a strong female lead? You betcha. But still, it makes me sad for Children. On the other hand, who knows what could happen in a year or two?

So that’s enough for today’s ramble. See you all later.

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