"I've brought us some fish."
Mar. 10th, 2007 05:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fishpatrolThough I promised myself that I'd devote my day studying statistics, I ended up spending most of the morning and afternoon reading The Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner. Who cares about ANOVA and F-statistics (adlkfajds) when there is a book full of excitement and intrigue, just waiting to be read. I absolutely loved Kushner's Swordspoint, as well as The Fall of the Kings to a lesser extent. The Privilege of the Sword is a sequel to Swordspoint and a prequel to The Fall of the Kings (though it was written most recently).
[Amazon summarizes the stories far better than I ever could ;;;]
All three books are set in Riverside -- an imaginary city with it's own political structure and customs (the world-building is fantastic -- it resembles real-life societies, but it has certain features that makes it original and unique), and I think that's one of the major reasons why the books are considered to be fantasy. Other than that, they read like history fiction, for the most part (with the exception of The Fall of the Kings, which goes into more magical aspects). Swordspoint is about Richard, a swordsman, and Alec, a (supposed) scholar. The Fall of the Kings takes place about a generation or so later, and tells the story of Alec's son Theron and Basil, a professor of history. The Privilege of the Sword (which is the subject of my current fangirling) takes place between the other two, and is about Alec's niece Katherine.
The narrative is elegant and descriptive, but not overbearingly so. The Privilege of the Sword switches between first-person POV and third-person, and I find that it works quite well for the story. You get to see the perspective of various characters, but you don't really quite see what they think, per se. The story skirts around some issues, and a great many things are implied rather than told to the reader directly. I think a story needs to strike a good balance between telling and showing (too much telling is awfully boring and too much showing can become confusing, IMO) -- Kushner leans more towards the showing aspect. There are parts where you're kind of like buh?? but loose ends are tied up (somewhat XD) at the end.
The characters are witty and cutting and they all have their own secret (or not-so-secret) motives. And backstories for the secondary characters are revealed bit-by-bit, very subtly. The protagonists are hardly paragons of virtue and the antagonists aren't cardboard cut-out villians. They're very human, with plenty of flaws.
I love how Kushner ties in the characters from the other two books into this story. There's a huge time gap between Swordspoint and The Fall of the Kings, and you're kind of just wondering "what the heck happened between the main characters of Swordspoint?" The Privilege of the Sword answers the question (somewhat XD;;) -- I was very glad to see the appearance of those two characters in this book, and it's interesting to see their relationship from a different character's point of view. I think you can read The Privilege of the Sword and The Fall of the Kings in any order, but definitely read Swordspoint first (as a side note, I think this is the kind of book where you curl up with a big mug of hot chocolate or tea on a cold winter day and read the whole thing in one go). ;)
The problem with finishing a really good book is that it leaves you in somewhat of a (happy) daze and then you're pretty much useless for the rest of the day.
--
Since I'm on a rambling rampage right now (and ignoring my statistics notes that are glaring at me -- they would be saying, "pay attention to us!" if they could speak, I'm sure), I may as well keep going. :D
So a few days ago, I was thinking about how I would like to write a story, an original story, with characters that I could love and a world that I could play in. I'm sure everyone has various worlds and alternate universes in their mind that they visit when they're in a particularly boring seminar or during a long bus ride, and so on and so forth. I thought that I could take one of mine and perhaps expand it. I thought and thought, but they wouldn't form into real stories -- they were merely a jumble of scenes with little connection to each other and characters with no backstories or motives. I guess I would like them to remain without reason and logic. Maybe they aren't meant to be let loose from the confines of my conscious (subconscious?). After a restless night (I think the reason why I couldn't sleep well was more due to the fact that I'd slept too much the night before rather than thinking too much XD), I came up with something that was entirely different than everything else that was already in my mind. It's hard to describe, but it sort of feels as if it's made from an entirely different substance. I want to poke at it and figure out what makes it different and why, but analyzing your own mind while you're part of it is kind of like trying to look at your own face without a reflective device.
I have a feeling that none of that made any sense.
Anyway, I have come to the realization that I really have no idea how to go about writing a long story because I haven't written anything more than 3000 words. I have an ending all mapped out and a semblance of a beginning, but the middle stuff? I got nothin'. (Well, I "got" a bit, but only vaguest of outlines and such). Now that I've written all this, I have another feeling that I will soon give up and ditch this writing idea altogether (as I am prone to do), but in the meantime, I will use it as a tool of procrastination and entertainment.
And now I have some questions for the writers on my flist:
How exactly does your writing process work? Which parts do you come up with first? Do you have a full outline before you start? Do you write everything in a chronological order, or do you write bits and pieces and put the whole thing together after you have enough scenes written?
Oh, and here's something I've been wondering about:
Do your characters actually speak to you in your mind? Or do you "see" and "hear" them interacting with each other?
The other day, I read this article about how some people (normal people) heard voices in their mind and how the voices often have distinct/different personalities. I think that is so fascinating.
My characters never talk to me. :( I am probably not cool enough for them.
My clock tells me that I have spent an hour on this entry. My stomach tells me that I'm starving. And if my stats notes had arms and hands, they would be rebelling right about now (that is a frightening thought -- they are frightening as is without limbs).
[Amazon summarizes the stories far better than I ever could ;;;]
All three books are set in Riverside -- an imaginary city with it's own political structure and customs (the world-building is fantastic -- it resembles real-life societies, but it has certain features that makes it original and unique), and I think that's one of the major reasons why the books are considered to be fantasy. Other than that, they read like history fiction, for the most part (with the exception of The Fall of the Kings, which goes into more magical aspects). Swordspoint is about Richard, a swordsman, and Alec, a (supposed) scholar. The Fall of the Kings takes place about a generation or so later, and tells the story of Alec's son Theron and Basil, a professor of history. The Privilege of the Sword (which is the subject of my current fangirling) takes place between the other two, and is about Alec's niece Katherine.
The narrative is elegant and descriptive, but not overbearingly so. The Privilege of the Sword switches between first-person POV and third-person, and I find that it works quite well for the story. You get to see the perspective of various characters, but you don't really quite see what they think, per se. The story skirts around some issues, and a great many things are implied rather than told to the reader directly. I think a story needs to strike a good balance between telling and showing (too much telling is awfully boring and too much showing can become confusing, IMO) -- Kushner leans more towards the showing aspect. There are parts where you're kind of like buh?? but loose ends are tied up (somewhat XD) at the end.
The characters are witty and cutting and they all have their own secret (or not-so-secret) motives. And backstories for the secondary characters are revealed bit-by-bit, very subtly. The protagonists are hardly paragons of virtue and the antagonists aren't cardboard cut-out villians. They're very human, with plenty of flaws.
I love how Kushner ties in the characters from the other two books into this story. There's a huge time gap between Swordspoint and The Fall of the Kings, and you're kind of just wondering "what the heck happened between the main characters of Swordspoint?" The Privilege of the Sword answers the question (somewhat XD;;) -- I was very glad to see the appearance of those two characters in this book, and it's interesting to see their relationship from a different character's point of view. I think you can read The Privilege of the Sword and The Fall of the Kings in any order, but definitely read Swordspoint first (as a side note, I think this is the kind of book where you curl up with a big mug of hot chocolate or tea on a cold winter day and read the whole thing in one go). ;)
The problem with finishing a really good book is that it leaves you in somewhat of a (happy) daze and then you're pretty much useless for the rest of the day.
--
Since I'm on a rambling rampage right now (and ignoring my statistics notes that are glaring at me -- they would be saying, "pay attention to us!" if they could speak, I'm sure), I may as well keep going. :D
So a few days ago, I was thinking about how I would like to write a story, an original story, with characters that I could love and a world that I could play in. I'm sure everyone has various worlds and alternate universes in their mind that they visit when they're in a particularly boring seminar or during a long bus ride, and so on and so forth. I thought that I could take one of mine and perhaps expand it. I thought and thought, but they wouldn't form into real stories -- they were merely a jumble of scenes with little connection to each other and characters with no backstories or motives. I guess I would like them to remain without reason and logic. Maybe they aren't meant to be let loose from the confines of my conscious (subconscious?). After a restless night (I think the reason why I couldn't sleep well was more due to the fact that I'd slept too much the night before rather than thinking too much XD), I came up with something that was entirely different than everything else that was already in my mind. It's hard to describe, but it sort of feels as if it's made from an entirely different substance. I want to poke at it and figure out what makes it different and why, but analyzing your own mind while you're part of it is kind of like trying to look at your own face without a reflective device.
I have a feeling that none of that made any sense.
Anyway, I have come to the realization that I really have no idea how to go about writing a long story because I haven't written anything more than 3000 words. I have an ending all mapped out and a semblance of a beginning, but the middle stuff? I got nothin'. (Well, I "got" a bit, but only vaguest of outlines and such). Now that I've written all this, I have another feeling that I will soon give up and ditch this writing idea altogether (as I am prone to do), but in the meantime, I will use it as a tool of procrastination and entertainment.
And now I have some questions for the writers on my flist:
How exactly does your writing process work? Which parts do you come up with first? Do you have a full outline before you start? Do you write everything in a chronological order, or do you write bits and pieces and put the whole thing together after you have enough scenes written?
Oh, and here's something I've been wondering about:
Do your characters actually speak to you in your mind? Or do you "see" and "hear" them interacting with each other?
The other day, I read this article about how some people (normal people) heard voices in their mind and how the voices often have distinct/different personalities. I think that is so fascinating.
My characters never talk to me. :( I am probably not cool enough for them.
My clock tells me that I have spent an hour on this entry. My stomach tells me that I'm starving. And if my stats notes had arms and hands, they would be rebelling right about now (that is a frightening thought -- they are frightening as is without limbs).
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Re: Long rambly comment go!
Date: 2007-03-17 05:40 am (UTC)And I think, also, that when they're in your mind, there are certain implicit assumptions you make so that you don't need to really explain anything to yourself, but once you write it out for an audience, then you need to explain things to them because they don't know what you know.
That is exactly it. They don't feel what I feel. Certain things might pain me deeply or make me really happy, but it's not the same level for everyone else. Writing a fic trying to get that across is very difficult sometimes. Sometimes you wonder if you did a good enough job.
I find that as I write, sometimes I think of another direction for the fic to go, a better one sometimes. I hate to abandon the other scenes that I had planned for later on, which is why I always have notes so even if I can't use them in that fic, I can with another. Combining two smaller fics into a larger one is very satisfying, especially when everything just seem to fall into place.
*hugs lots* I would plan as far as the next scene. Then I'd sit on the fic for days/weeks/months until another inspiration hits with the next scene. If I have too many scenes planned out, I become lazy because it seems like a lot of work. *IS SO BAD*