Extra Hour

Even with the extra hour, from Daylight Savings Time, I'm once again off to a slow start.

Fighting a stomach flu, I can sit at my desk for only a few minutes and sit up in bed to work on the Chrome Book from maybe a half hour at a stretch.And I don't think I want to do another zombie book. Which means a month of research down the shitter.

More Basics

http://cluelessink.blogspot.com/2010/07/techniques-of-selling-writer-by-dwight.html

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/index.htm

Stoned to Death

I may be stoned to death for saying this but I think 'how to write fiction' books are worse than useless. It sets otherwise good to fair writers feet on the wrong paths.

I've spent time this summer running refresher courses for David's sock puppet stable on sentence structure and building paragraphs. Bought internet content requires a minimum level of quality control.

He thought hiring writers would be a great idea, however these are fanfic writers who can discourse character development, plot construction, and other abstractions of the art of writing and know bugger all about the nuts and bolts of grammar and composition. In fact they consider such practical knowledge the nitpicking of little minds.

Almost all my remedial efforts consisted of composition basics: sentence variety, paragraphing, with transitions and signpost, and scene structure, which is similar to paragraph structure. Most of the problems could have been done away with if the writers had read the following;

Writing the Perfect Scene. A streamlined take on Swain's classic 'scene and sequel'.

Purdue's Online Writing Lab. Yes, academic writing; the basics are there, concise and accessible.

Also the mechanically inclined books:

The Elements of Style by Strunk and White

The Lively Art of Writing by Lucile Vaughan Payne

Thinking on Paper by V.a. Howard and J.H. Barton


Yes all three deal with essay writing; practical concerns to get words on paper with unity and clarity.

To concede the need for 'how to write fiction', I include the three most cynical books on fiction writing ever. Airy fairy abstractions need not apply.

Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain


How to Write a Damn Good Novel 1 & 2 by James N. Frey

Lord of the Flies

I've opted not to reread LotF. When I steal from other works I pick up odd syntax and it stays with me for a while as I use the material.

I'm going with lifting from Sparknotes and some quick overviews on Youtube, such as the Great Book narrated by Donald Sutherland.

Character cross reference

I could start back at the highway, after read through the trilogy material, there seems to be only a single longish novel from the useable bits.

LotF cross reference

Andre is Jack

CJ is Ralph

Bart is Roger

Nicole is Simon

Steven is Piggy

Michael and Ana have no c/r they are more the conch and glasses.

Dead End day 28

Now that I've been turning it over in my mind the trilogy is based on the Lord of the Flies.

The theme is civilization vs savagery as well as old world vs new world.

Both Andre and CJ are leaders of the old world.

Michael and Ana are the conch and fire making eyeglasses.

Dead End day 28

And scene.

Didn't figure out the end. So it will be a quartet or the fourth book will be a summary of the trilogy written right instead of as an apocalypse travelogue.

Dead End day 27

I spent the day figuring out where everything went wrong. Got a thousand plus words out of thinking at the keyboard. I think I'll push on an finish tonight.

Dead End day 26 (a little late)

Been thinking at the keyboard for a while, I may hove figured out where I went off track with the Lord of the Flies theme.

Dead End day 24

I have two days and five thousand days to try and get the finale back on the Lord of the Flies track.

Dead End day 23

The pre-holiday push is on. Three days before Thanksgiving.

Much pre-writing during errands this morning, many notes taken.

I've been writing gobbledegook for the last two hours, but that is almost another two thousand words on the pile.

Dead End Day 22

Laundry, typing, and power napping. About up to 20wmp on a regular keyboard, less than half that on my Chrome Book.

I abandoned the Iceberg Theory and writing in classic scenes or paragraphs.

I filled the pages with the bulk of my research and my theories on the 'fast' vs 'slow' zombies.

Dead End Day 19

Hunkered down for just over a thousand words.

Dead End Day 14 and 15

Hunkered down and typed with all my fingers. Too much back story and a side thread that goes nowhere.

Dead End Day 10

Got word count up. a lot of work for something I'm just going to edit out.

I have to re-read A Book of Five Rings, I've been making up Mushasi quotes.

DEAD END DAY 9

Hunkered down to 3000+ words, most of it back story with a cutaway to the goings on at Bufton Point. So much for the 'iceberg theory', Again word count over artistic vision.

Dead End Day 8

My stay-cation turned into a slumber party, I'm almost two days behind.

After I run some errands I hope to hunker down and type with all my fingers. I never happy with the results - but I have to get my word count up.

Dead End Day 4

Been sleeping in long naps; getting scant work done. I'm actually taking this stay-cation off.

Word count is 3436, which puts me at yesterday morning.Once again I'm averaging a grand and change in words per day; it seems to be a natural plateau.

Ana's having having doubts about going on

Michael is becoming the job, he's quoting Mushashi and Sun Tzu, although he wants to be the token husband Ana needs to keep a grip on what hope there is.

Andre is unkilled; he, CJ, and Steven are in a three way struggle for alpha male. Adre and CJ by brute force, Steven by animal cunning.Michael took the ultralight out as much as possible to avoid being a second Steven and waking the struggle a four way.


Ana think she broke the u;tra light, it was Michael pushing it to the limit once too often.

Dead End day 1

I don't like the tittle, but I'm headed back to the zombie apocalypse.

With any luck I'll get a few hundred words tonight; I have to take my car into the shop and spend the day running errands on buses. I get scant work done on a skittering netbook.

Sky Baron

I might take all the research I've one for an alternative past and write a novel set in the World of the Sky Baron, a practical, and safe, lift gas secures a future where airships are still the dominate means of travel and freight carriage. The skyways are under the control of one preternatural man.