Clee Hill: Blog

Leri.

This character is fast turning into something of a problem child.

Originally, she wasn't going to be in Book One, but there is utility to her character, so she got brought forward.

Next, when first drafting her speech patterns, she fell much too easily into a comedy Welsh voice. It's a voice I might use for someone else, but she's not a comic character, so it's time for a partial re-write.

I then spent a happy afternoon writing her introductory scene. It wasn't quite right, but I put that down to being the first pass. Then I walked the dogs this morning, and as I did I realised that scene needed re-writing.

Sigh.

She's a fun character, plays nicely into the Rowden sibling dynamic, but she's a little slippery right now.

CH

For those catching up or going back, there's been a mix-up with chapters. The correct days for the correct chapters are queued up in the submission wizard. Sigh.

Cheers...CH

My thanks to all those who caught this chapter's goofs.

Sigh.

Time to try a different word processor - again! - and hopefully this one can grammar check. Reliably.

Now, one of the aids for proof-reading is to render the text onto a coloured background so that it looks new and different, the intention being that you read the text afresh and thereby spot the issues.

Seems my colour-blindness really didn't help in that.

Next chapter I'll try proofing with an alternate font and different coloured background, and we'll see how that goes.

Anyhoo, there's a new version of Chapter Ten in the submission queue with lots of corrections in it, as 'donated' by the 'early adopters'.

Cheers to all...CH

Into the queue, so should be up soon.

Plenty of fun in the jewellers, plus the imminent arrival of a new character in the next chapter to stir things up for the Rowden siblings.

Oh, in case anyone thinks that what Stef does is in any way a departure for her character - reasons.

This story is tightly plotted, characters are already developed, so if anyone does anything, there's a reason to it.

As the reader of a not-yet finished story, those reasons might only make sense in retrospect. Especially as they're not apparent to the characters themselves. Yet.

Gnomic, huh?

Cheers...CH

Sigh.

The first drafts for the first fifteen days of The Wilhelm Scream were written quite a few months back now.

Since then, as I've edited, thought, and generally spent more time with Luke, Stef, et al, etc., I've come to find the later chapters more require re-writing than editing, a surprise for me since I didn't remember those first drafts as being thus.

But I was doing my best, soldiering along manfully, and then I came to chapter ten.

Ah.

One scene that was remembered as being important, and which is important going forward from this point, was breezed over in only a few paragraphs. Another scene featured an under-cooked character who really needed development, and in his development this allows me to drop a few more hints in about The Thing, ahead of when 'first draft me' imagined they would happen.

The upshot of this is that chapter ten, now I know where it's headed, is about 80% re-writing, plenty of scything out of vast tracts of text, and I don't imagine the remaining four chapters after this will be in any better shape.

Consequently, though the incidents shall remain as they were in terms of plot progression, I think that most of what was already written now needs to hit the recycle bin. Fortunately, Luke and Stef have a few little adventures left in them between now and the end of Book One, a new character will be along for the ride to keep me on my toes, and The Thing might not be quite so backgrounded as I'd orignally planned.

At least I can now see that Book One might come to its conclusion sometime around Day Sixteen, as by that stage Luke and Stef and The Thing should be where I need them to be for the conclusion that's coming.

Onward!

CH