The Wood Beyond The World Forum Currently working on...

The Brothers Karoli, still, for me.  It's been nearly a year since I started, and I'm up to Chapter Sixteen.  Going slow, but I think well. The plot thickens, as the saying goes, and I'm sticking quite close to my original outline, though of course certain characters and features of the story have become more important than I at first anticipated. I think it'll make a good starting place for the entire Alliance Chronicles, though there are likely some stories (should I have opportunity to write them) that come chronologically before Brothers.

I haven't reviewed anyone for ages.  Sorry.  Maybe life will permit me to begin reviewing again soon.

What's up with everyone else?

I've revised A Meddle of Wizards for at least the twentieth time (I quite like the new beginning), and am getting rejected by agents left and right.  I got so frustrated with the whole process that I've set my fantasy series aside (nearly finished with Book Two of that), and started working on a paranormal romance.  I'm up to chapter eight with plans to finish it by the end of April.  It's great fun, and I'm having a blast writing it.  Quite naughty, though.

Jeanie

Oh, I like naughty.

Just ask Nick.

Speaking of Nick...where are you, Grasshopper?

I'm taking a break from trying to sell Servant of the Phrenet- the first book of  The Quolltellan series.

I am adapting the second book of the series to be a stand alone novel with the option of being part of a series. That might sound confusing but it means I'll have two copies of the same book with different titles Danyon (book 2 ) and The Warrior Magician (book 1). WM has a lot more explanation and back story.

That way, which ever gets picked up first will determine what happens next.

I am also working on Red - a real YA, < 80 000 words, no sex,  some violence and horror but nothing too graphic. Finding and accepting your true self - even if it is being a shapechanging alien. Set on three interconnecting worlds with two teenage heroines and several dishy guys.

Currently working throught the second draft.

This year I'm going to be so busy studying that I'll won't have any time to write so I'd like to have a couple of books out there, quietly going from agent to agent. I'm convinced that Red will be the first one picked up as the female YA market seems to be very busy at the moment. Unfortunately I still have a lot of work to do on it.

Gayna

When Gayna says, "I am adapting the second book of the series to be a stand alone novel with the option of being part of a series. That might sound confusing ...," I find no confusion in it, as my writing over the past several years has followed a similar path.

Like Gayna, I believe my second novel, War on Error, will be my foot in the door. Interestingly, this book also belongs to a shapechanging alien protagonist finding and accepting his true self, another similarity with Gayna's work. For both our sakes, may such works catch on in our lifetimes.

My first book, Wings Not Required, I have not made much effort to sell. I wrote it thinking it would be my only opportunity to write a novel, and I had resolved to write the book I wanted all my life to write. This I did, and there is a great deal of good in it. But at 145,000 words, I came late to understand that the book is too long to find a publisher as a first novel

I therefore jumped right into constructing a second novel, War on Error, that would fit all the criteria of a first novel. I drew characters from Wings Not Required, making of Wings a prequel (and a convenient and detailed backstroy informing War on Error) to the work I intend to agent this year. My shapeshifting protagonist was a largely silent though important character in the first book, and I decided Book Two would belong to him, as he was easily the most unusual character to emerge from Book One. I suspect any agent that will sign up to sell War on Error will be anxious to read Wings, as the two books are intimately connected, though no reader need know anything of the first book to read War on Error.

War on Error of course is better written than Wings because the first novel is where I learned to tell a story, where I learned the craft. I'm given to understand that most first books published are not first books written, but are usually the third or fourth novels written by any given author.

I am in the enviable position of needing only to enhance the first two scenes of the 45 scene novel to make War on Error complete and ready to query. Of course no one will ever read the last 43 scenes if they are not adequately drawn in by the opening scenes. Thus I am taking an inordinate amount of time rewriting the opening of War, knowing that the entirety of several years work relies on my making people love the opening. And that is the goal: A good agent, and then an editor, and then the money men, all must love the book, or it will never see the light of day.

If you can't write something worthy of readers' love, then you have no chance of selling it. This, I think, is the bottom line any author serious about finding a contract must constantly keep in mind. Make the work original, captivating, humorous, charming, and never bore the reader, even for a single sentence. Let the story express the truth you hold in your hearts, authors, and don't hold back. The reader must visualize and identify with exactly what you intend. Aim high, and don't toss out unusual lines because you think they might be unacceptable. Steven Spielberg spoke at the Golden Globes last night, and he mentioned that if he is not asking the question of his work, "Can I get away with this?" then he will not undertake the project. In other words, if the truth expressed in our work is not compelling, then it has little chance of being competitive art.