You're only supposed to blow the bloody doors off

Chapter eight is in the bag. 5016 words and, unlike some of the early chapters, I really enjoyed writing this one. Actually the last three or four chapters were good fun, with lots of death and blood and destruction. One of the casualties of chapter 6 was the plan. I'd written five or six bullet points describing what happens for each of the chapters 6 to 15. I don't know why I'm surprised but, just like in Echo, the story went its own way when I started wondering what the characters would do in this situation and the answer was not actually what I intended. Again This isn't always a bad thing. Having got themselves in a difficult situation I spent ages trying to figure out how to get them out of it. I needn't have bothered. By the end of chapter 6 York's crew are different starships and in mortal danger. Ok smartarses, what now. Fortunately they're a resourceful lot and they worked out a plan. York's crew like to have a plan. By the end of chapter 8 they're well on the way to sorting themselves out. Those of you that are writers will be nodding along to my comments. The rest of you will probably think I'm nuts To continue. That was too easy I thought. Actually it wasn't easy and lots of people died (don't worry, they're not real people) but I decided to intervene (interfere) so I've just created a cliffhanger for the end of chapter 8 that sees Echo trapped outside a spaceship with her oxygen supply leaking from her damaged suit and they're under attack. Will she survive? Of course she will, I've got another sixteen chapters to write. I'm making no promises that she'll survive to the end of the book though.

John McCain wouldn't approve

I love gadgets. Some people are surprised to find that I'm not an early adopter of techie stuff, but once I've got it, I usually embrace it. I've had my iPad for about a month - I waited until it was a 3rd generation before i took the plunge, but it's like it's nailed to my hand. One of the reasons I went for a iPad 3 was that it has a voice recognition function. It works well, although it does cope better with a Scots accent than it does with my flat vowels. It's a very cool thing, however it hasn't got the use that I expected it to. Partly it's that I tend to write in the evening whilst not really watching the telly. Mostly it's because I can type faster than I can dictate. That's not quite true. I obviously type slower than I can speak, but that slight delay allows me to think through what I want to put down in a few words time. I read about writers who still write longhand, or insist on using some vintage Olivetti. I can understand that now. Dictating leads to lots of pauses and umms as I try to keep up with myself and, most importantly, the result isn't as grammatically or dramatically satisfying. Sometimes speed isn't everything. I recently watched a Programme on Quest about the development of the submachinegun. Some ex special forces type tried out all the key SMGs developed over the last seventy years. Rather than the Thompson, which had a high rate of fire, he preferred the 'grease gun'. Cheaper and less elegant, but the reason for his choice was that it had a lower rate of fire. If you watch the Die Hard series, it's all about the quantity of lead, but the real soldier preferred the better control and accuracy that it achieved. The Bad Girls clearly favour spraying about large quantities of depleted uranium rounds but Echo's weapon of choice only has eight rounds in the chamber and she has to conserve them, preferring selective and accurate fire over the room broom approach. It's still a cool button though. I'll just have to find a better way to use it.

Incredible stretchy pants

Is it possible to create something that combines all four aspects of character, plot, action and detail? I suspect we all set out to do all four but, somewhere down the line, we start to major on one or two of these at the expense of the others. Probably not on purpose, but we focus on the bits that interest us most. I started this train of thought just after going to see the Avengers movie. Visually impressive, if a little intense. Plot? Not really. Action, most certainly. Characterisation? Well they tried. Captain America was uptight and upright. Bruce Banner and the Iron Man guy were meant to be geeky and the Black Widow was meant to be a hard edged spy and assassin (no, there's none of her DNA in Echo). So, a good idea but,actually, they were all completely out-acted by the Hulk, who was a cartoon and had the best line in the whole film. And the most remarkable trousers. I know I'm a writer rather than a film director but, as I've said before, I'm just writing down details of the film that's playing in my head. I'm curious to know if other writers are the same. So, trying to be objective, can I manage all four of those things? No Character - I have two main characters who I think are reasonably interesting and feedback, particularly about Echo, has been reasonably positive. The others are mostly cardboard cut outs although I'm trying to make a few of them three dimensional so that you'll care about the one(s)who die. Plot - well there's a few large holes in the plot of Echo. Some of them are there on purpose as I've been intending to fill them in E2, or possibly in E3. The broad outline is in my head and I actually wrote it down in some detail when writing Echo although stuff changed as I wrote, when I had to follow the characters rather than forcing them to obey the plan. My intentions for E2 have changed recently. I'm on chapter 6 and, by now, we should have moved into Vargrr space and we should be well on our way to finding the Clarke. But the crew of the citadel are trapped on the cruiser Admiral Stobo and trying to fight their way out. The plot of E2 was set in motion in Echo and I think it will be a simpler story that the first, although I do have a few loose ends to sort out and so it may become more complex. Action - there was action in Echo, but I'm starting to see that E2 is probably going to have more action than E1. Echo was mostly about the relationship between two people. E2 details the breakdown of that relationship (temporary or permanent, I'm not saying -partly because I haven't decided). Detail - as I've said before, I think my job is to create a framework and for the reader to create their own film. I think i'll be majoring on action and characterisation. But I've been wrong before. It's an exciting ride. But enough about me, what does the reader want from me when they boot up their Kindle?And do they want the same thing every time? With books, I'm ALWAYS looking for the same thing. Reasonable plot but strong characterisation (and minimal description). I was about to say that films are different but I think I'd be wrong. I went to see the Avengers movie not because of the film but because I wanted to have some Dad and boys time. We bought fizzy and sweeties and had a laugh at the jokes (the boys seemed to be pretty indifferent to Gwyneth Paltrow, but then they're 13 and haven't quite got girls yet) Star Wars, my all time favourite film is still visually stunning and all the more impressive considering the limited technology but, if I was going to be objective, could have been so much more. It's easy to forget how dark a film it is. Luke's uncle and aunt are reduced to smoking skeletons, Obi Wan chops off somebody's arm in a bar fight, a whole planet is destroyed and Han Solo fired first. But that level of menace isn't sustained, Luke is transformed into ace pilot and Han into a good guy. I hear the original version was panned by audiences and only drastic editing saved it from being scrapped. Partly I wonder whether a director's cut would be a good thing or whether Biggs Darklighter, a major character who was completely cut from the final version, is better as a pub trivia question. Look at what happened when George Lucas finally got the technology to create the film he really wanted. Did he beef up the characters or add meaty plot? No, he just coloured it in. Enough on star wars. Alien. Plot. Not really. Detail- dark, greasy, grim. Characters? Ripley develops well but the others are basically just there to make up numbers. Action- absolutely, and the scariest film I've seen I'd argue that nobody does everything well and great things have been created by focussing on one or two parts rather than trying to do the lot. Overanalysing is probably not a good thing. Will it make my book better? Probably not. Will it make it less fun? It might. Despite it being an old question, I did spend part of the Avengers thinking about how come the Hulk, who was massively too big for Bruce Banner's jeans wasn't naked but, when he turned back, Bruce Banner, who fit the jeans, was.

Colouring book

When I write, I can see the action in my mind. I picture the camera angles and can hear the explosions or klaxons or whatever. As well as whatever's in focus, I also have a fairly clear idea what the room or compartment or whatever looks like. However , I don't inflict a detailed description on the readers unless it's relevant. I did it in Ch 1 of Echo because I wanted to get across the impression that starships were battered, workaday, grubby tools like the Nostromo rather than the clean and shiny world of Star Trek. As a writer, I want to create the broad outlines and then allow the reader to colour the picture in. Your camera angle may be completely different to mine, and the characters are likely to look completely different in your head to what's in mine. I described Echo as having jaw length, bobbed hair and green eyes. That was it. It wasn't till Cathy Helms did the cover art that she became a brunette (and acquired a trout pout). One of the first readers thought the Bad Girls were 7 feet tall (they're not, but they can be if you want) and, if you were paying attention, you may know that Acre is blond and has her hair plaited into cornrows, Pearce is tall and thin, and I may have told you that Hemingray is small and has a blond bubble perm. However, if you want them to look different, that's fine. Some writers want to transfer the cinematic experience that's in their head into yours without allowing the freedom to interpret it as you see fit. Have a look at this: Jason Bourne eeled his way through the mob. He was assaulted by the bone-juddering, heart attack inducing, soul-shattering blast of music coming from ten-foot-tall speakers set on either end of the enormous dance floor. Above the dancers' heads an aurora boreal is of lights splintered, coalesced, and then shattered against the domed ceiling like an armada of comets and shooting stars. That was taken from one of the posthumous Jason Bourne novels. It's a 100,000 word adventure wrapped in a 200,000 word book. Part of the problem is that Jason himself isn't very interesting. I've read several of the Ludlum and post Ludlum versions and, unlike say James Bond, it's quite difficult to get a handle on the man himself. I enjoyed the three Bourne films with Matthew Damon. Not for their portrayal of Jason Bourne, but for the way they handled crises and action scenes. The realism used in the Bourne films was taken up by the Daniel Craig version of Bond. Violence is brutal and ugly rather than stylised or glamourous. Part of Echo's (genetically engineered) DNA came from the Jason Bourne. Another DNA donor is Jack Reacher. He's a much more interesting character although I've never really warmed to him as a person (if you see what I mean) which is no mean feat in itself. I like the way that we see Reacher's process of deduction and I particularly like the way he previsualised a fight. I forget which book it's in but, at one point he's faced with three men and it described, succinctly but effectively, which one he's going to batter first, how he's going to do it and why he's made those choices. So, Bourne is a boring cardboard cut out and Reacher is an interesting, if slightly unpleasant, character. I'd like to think that Echo is a reasonably interesting and sympathetic character and that's why I've had such positive feedback. It's difficult to judge the value of your own creation. In the next post I'll talk about whether you can have well drawn characters, strong plots and detailed description or whether something has to be compromised to create a book that works. Actually it's just an excuse to talk about Hulk underwear.

Cardboard cut out

Incedental characters are more difficult than I would have expected. Although most of Echo is set in the closed environment of a starship, on occassions the crew of the citadel class have to interact with other people. How detailed should those people be, given the fact that most of them have a limited life expectancy. Some of the incidentals have names, mainly because it's a fairly natural thing to introduce yourself to people, but also because it's easier to write Joe Bloggs said, rather than the man in the raincoat said, over and over again. But, once they have a name, do i have a responsibility to make then slightly more real? No, of course not. Is it helpful to round them out a bit? I don't really know. When writing Echo I asked one of the First Readers how individual I should make the Bad Girls and they said they were disposable cannon fodder rather than main characters. Shame as I quite like them, probably more than some of the other main characters and might struggle if some of them don't get to survive E2? Just to make life more difficult, I'm writing several real people into E2. How many words should they get? Professor Helms, genetic engineer is in chapter 4 although I'm not sure I've got the voice right. There's a conversation with Echo which gets interrupted - considering she got a couple of pages, is it going to be weird when she just disappears? However that will be difficult as she doesn't survive past chapter 8. Sorry Cat. On a complete aside, am I the only person who noticed that a minor character in the first series of 24 caused the crash of a jumbo jet (for a reason that I never really figured out) and the fate of the jumbo never gets another mention? On another complete aside, I'm writing this on my new iPad :-)

Shall we take the Volvo?

I'm grateful to Terry Deary. If you haven't heard of him, he's a writer who created the Horrible Histories.A few years ago we got a set of Horrible History CDs with a box cornflakes. We played them in the car on long journeys for a couple of years. Eventually the boys bought themselves the HH books and every time i went looking for them, i'd find them with their nose in a Horrible History.

Terry Deary got my boys reading. We didn't need to push them, hassle them, cajole them. They just started reading because they found something that interested them.

I still love Horrible Histories. My particular favorite bit is Stupid Deaths. Have a look on YouTube.

What is it about death that fascinates writers? Excluding the chick lit section, the vast majority of books in the library are thrillers or cop procedurals or horror or sword and sorcery, all involving mayhem and murder. My antihero was an assasin.

"Death comes to us all. When he came to Mort, he offered him a job." This is a cracking line from when Terry Pratchett was still funny. Death is a reoccuring character in the Discworld stories and has all the best lines.

My favorite bit from Monty Python's Meaning of Life is the section about death. "How did we die?...But i didn't have the salmon mousse." Sorry, like many Python fans i like to quote the dialogue.

I suspect it's something to do with talking about the thing we fear. If we name the beast, it's not so frightening. When i had surgery a couple of years ago, i talked about it a lot in the couple of weeks before the surgery. It made me feel better about it.

It's a heavy responsibility, helping everybody face their fears. I'm sure we're up to the job.

Of course, i could be talking blox.

Polka dot pants

I've hardly read anything recently. Life has been hectic and my laptop takes a million years to boot up so all the books i've bought on kindle in the last couple of months (including yours, fellow authors) are largely languishing unappreciated. Somebody i know read Echo on his iPhone. We were a bit sceptical, but it worked for him - he could read a bit of book every time he had 5-10 minutes to spare.

My ipod won't do that since it had 50 minutes in a 40 degree dark wash - the apps work but the wireless appears to be gone forever and the battery life is now less than a mayfly's.


However, i'm fairly hopeful that i'm about to enter the 21st century and get an ipad. Because:

a) it's my birthday shortly
b) i've been muttering about it for ages
c) it's tax deductable
d) everybody else has one
e) my wife is getting a bluetooth hands free car kit
f) i really really want one

:-)

That's an aside really. I came on to write about E2. I'm in the middle of chapter 4 and i'm concious that it's a real frippery and doesn't move the plot on. But then there are chapters of Echo that are about people rather than plot development.

I should just plough on and let the beta readers decide if it stays. E2 is sooooo  much harder than Echo to write. I suspect it's a reaction to the teasing i get at work, particularly about the sex scenes and particularly particularly about the polka dot pants. i threw that in for a laugh and to try and add a bit of colour and humour, but hardly a day goes by when it doesn't get thrown into a conversation.

Beware sex scenes, murders and continuity errors. Also beware loose ends. The AltSpace monsters were intended to be a cameo, but i now have to think about where they can fit into E2/3. Hopefully it won't need a shoe horn

on an unrelated note, i had a conversation with a reader

"i'm reading your book."
"are you enjoying it?"
"i started reading and then realised, oh, it's science fiction" (i would hve thought the spaceship on the cover was a givaway)
"oh, sorry about that."
"and then there's all these murders." (read the blurb!- Echo murdered her way....)

Ashley McCook blogged about how hard the blurb was to write but how important it was when choosing a book. Unless, of course, the reader doesn't take any notice of it.


So, beware polka dot pants, they can bite you (hopefully metaphorically)