Month: July 2017

A Broken World

I was going through a bunch of papers the other day and I came across an old manuscript that I had abandoned a long time ago. I got to reading it in order to get a feel for what it was and I couldn’t imagine why I never got around to finishing it. It had the potential to be a great work of art. The plot was thrilling, the characters were complex and easy to relate to, and there was enough action to keep you reading.

There was also large gaps in the narrative. And by large I mean, gaps large enough to drive a mac truck through. These gaps in the narrative, I came to realize didn’t come from holes in a pretty sound plot line, they came from the fact that the world in which my characters exist is broken.

You heard me right. I broke the world and it is going to take some doing to put it back together again. When non-fiction writers are doing their research, us fictioneers are breaking… er,,, building worlds.

World building, as it turns out, is just as important to literary works as everything else. It is way too easy to forget that the environment, both natural and otherwise, is something that characters interact with every moment of their lives, just as we do. How the world around them works, often dictates the circumstances that our hero’s find themselves in and sometimes influences the actions of our hero in the most subtle and profound ways.

As a reader, we see this in all of our great works of fiction. What purpose would Anne McCaffrey’s dragons serve if life devouring thread wasn’t falling from the sky? Would Harry Potter still be “The Boy Who lived,” if there wasn’t magic in his world? We just never really think about it.

However, as a writer, it is essential that we do think about these things and have an idea of what is going on in the worlds we create. It does have an effect on the stories we capture. When there is a hole in the over all environment that our heros inhabit, it can and in my case, did lead to massive holes within the narrative.

I will eventually go back and finish that particular manuscript. It is a story that is too epic to leave in the bottom of my sock drawer. I just have to take the time to reimagine the world where it takes place because that will determine a lot of the factors that my trusty group of heros will have to contend with.

The Most Important Thing.

Today I was asked a rather serious question and it took me quite by surprise. I was asked, “What is the most important thing that a writer should know?”

I was stunned to say the least. I simply don’t see myself as a bastion of writer’s wisdom, not do I see myself as a professional writer, as I still grind out most of my days in the usual dead end job. However, is was a serious question and I believe that it deserves a serious answer.

So, I put my feet up, sipped on some coffee and gave the question some serious thought.

The first things that came to the forefront of my mind were the usual suspects; grammar, spelling, vocabulary and proper usage.

I am a bit of a grammar Nazi, so it isn’t all that surprising that grammar was the first thing to come to my mind. It is after all the key to clear communication and that is what writing really is all about, connecting to your audience and communicating your ideas and stories.  Sharing one’s vision with the world is next to impossible if one’s audience cannot understand what is being said. So, yes, grammar is an important thing, it is not THE most important thing. Excellent books on grammar are a dime a dozen, and it only takes a little bit of practice to master it. The same goes for proper usage.

It is almost the same with spelling and vocabulary. As a writer type person with mild dyslexia, I can firmly testify as to the usefulness of the modern spellchecker. While the spellchecker may be your friend, it is my lifesaver. On a good day, I might be able to spell my own name, just maybe. On a bad day, I count myself lucky if I don’t misspell every single word. This of course doesn’t stop me from writing. I still have tales to tell and I am not going to let a little thing like bad spelling stop me. Though I do hate my vocabulary to be limited to what I can spell. Along side my trusty spellchecker, my dictionary  is my best buddy. I have even been known to sleep with one, cuddling it like a teddy bear.

So, if the usual suspects are not the most important things, because they can be worked on and around, what is?

All of the more advanced skills, character development, finding good solid plot lines, dialog ect. can all be learned and mastered with a bit of determination and a whole lot of hard work. They can also be worked on and around.

I sipped some more coffee and stretched my legs out and look up at the painting hanging off my wall. I found it.

A long time ago, when man still lived in caves, I used to be an artist. I could paint the most wonderful and beautiful images. The only difference between now and then, is that now I paint those pictures using words instead of colour. As a painter, the one thing that is more important than everything else, is for the artist to finish the work, to be sure that each and every painting is utterly complete. It doesn’t matter if there is flaws in the picture. It doesn’t have to be perfect. You can always do better next time and if you paint enough, you will get better. You will improve. Being perfect, isn’t the most important thing, finishing what you start is.

In this respect, writing, is exactly like drawing, painting and all of the other arts. It doesn’t matter if ones story isn’t perfect, or if there are a few awkward spots. Even a few run on sentences could be overlooked as long and the work is complete and fully finished. In all things, the artist, in this case the writer, with get better over time.

The most important thing for a writer to know, is how to finish the work, and make it complete.

Chasing Fireflies, a Bit of Summertime Fun

chasingfireflies

This review is a day late, but then I got the file very late on the night before it was supposed to come out. For that dear readers, you have my apologies. It was well worth the wait and I this anthology a lot. It is the perfect book to curl up with on those bright summer nights when the stars are peeking out and the mosquitoes are out to drink your blood.

Summertime it the season of romance after all and there isn’t anything better than a great romance. This book just happens to have nine, coming from a set of extremely talented indie authors. While I did like some stories more than others, all of them were good satisfying reads.

I particularly enjoyed The Doctor and the Demon, Scarborough Fair.  I liked these stories, not just because I do admittedly have a strong preference for fantasy and supernatural elements in the fiction I read, but also because they had strong characters. Both of these stories featured the kind of characters that like to do their own thing regardless of what their creators might want.

I also really liked A Summer Affair. I loved the over all,old harlequin romance feel of the story. Okay, I know that I really shouldn’t admit to liking Harlequin romance book in public, but they are a guilty pleasure. They are a lot like old friends. A Summer Affair has that feel to it and it also managed to break the mold when the heroine makes an unconventional choice at the end.

While I am here, I also want to make a special not on The Eye of the Storm. I am a bit biased when it comes to Diane Morrison’s work as we have been friends for quite along time and I am quite familiar with Shaundar and his host of brave companions. However, don’t let that keep you from reading it for yourself. It is an excellent romance and it touched on a lot of rather deep modern themes, and challenges one to look closer on how we think of things like race, duty, and matters of the heart.

All the Crown Jewels. Part Two

“Okay,” He breathed, still being careful to keep his voice low. “We are in. You have an idea of where the treasury is right?”

Kara shook here head. “No. Where would the fun in that be?”

He stifled a groan.

“Don’t worry.” She went on. “We will find it. It will be where the most guards are.”

Stark sighed. They kept their ears open and strolled through the passage. It opened abruptly onto a rather large cavern which had been fashioned into a training yard. Barracks and what appeared to be the armoury was embedded in two of the three walls that faced them and a gate dominated the third.

There was considerably more light here as well. The flickering gaslights and torches of the city were gone. In their place were bright glowing orbs. They filled the empty space with eerie blue and green, unwavering light.

“We can’t stay here.” Kara murmured. “There is no cover. That gate must lead into the palace proper, but where are the guards?”

“I don’t know.” Snark replied. “And I don’t care. It’s bad luck to look too closely at found coin. Let’s go.”

The pair dashed across the open space to the gate. Even here, there were very few shadows. The gate had been cut into the wall seamlessly and all the stone had been polished to a mirror shine. All the better for maximizing what little light there is underground. In all of the known world, there was no one better at stonework than a dwarf, and it seamed that only the best laid hands on this gate and the palace beyond.

Their luck was holding. Not only were there no guards stationed at this gate, it had also been left open. Snark followed Kara through and gently closed the gate behind them. Open gates, especially those leading into the homes of kings, had away of drawing unwanted attention. He didn’t pull the bar down though. It was always best to leave possible escape routes open. One never knew when one was going to be needed.

They kept to the shadows as best they could. It wasn’t long until they found their way into the palace proper, and the place was filled with more of that eerie blue and green light. There was far more light here than Snark had expected, and it was quiet. It would have been easy to avoid any patrolling dwarves because they would have heard them coming. The average dwarf wouldn’t be able to sneak up on a man if his life depended on it. Dwarves simply just didn’t know how to move quietly.

Which made the silence of the palace corridors grate on Snark’s nerve all the more. Where were the courtiers? The dukes? The earls? Or whatever passed as nobility here in this nation? And the servants, where were they?

This is wrong. Kara signed. It feels too easy. There is no way these halls should be empty like this. We should have seen someone by now.

Agreed. He replied. Let’s just find that treasury and get out of here. I don’t want to get caught up in whatever is going on here.

The layout of this place is starting to feel familiar to me. Her fingers twitched as her she looked around. I think that the treasury should be close to the royal apartments.

Just lead the way to the gold. He winked. I will follow.

Snark followed her as she lead him through the grand halls of the palace. If there was one thing that he could appreciate about dwarves, it was this. They liked to build in a nice ordered fashion. This made it difficult to get lost and much easier to find what one was looking for. They kept off the main corridors as best they could. Kara had a good sense of direction and a almost supernatural knack of ending up exactly where she wanted to be. Snark, well, he did get lost in his own house once. In his defence, he was awfully drunk at the time.

They came to a junction where several corridors came together and it was here that their luck gave out. Heavy footsteps bounced off the marble walls, making it impossible to determine the direction that they were coming from.

“Crap.” Kara swore. “Where are they coming from? They are coming closer.”

“Damned if I know.” Snark replied. “I have an idea.”

He ran to nearest lamp and blew it out. Kara, following his lead did the same and the pair of them crowded into the shadows behind one of the columns. Snark hoped whomever it was would pass by without noticing them.

A pair of kolbolds rounded the corner, followed by another pair. Snark wasn’t up on kolbold livery, however he could guess that the over large goblinoid creature that loomed over the rest was a person of importance, a chieftain or maybe a shaman perhaps.

Next came the dwarven king. He was paced by two kolbold warriors, one on either side of him. He still held the emblems of kingship, the jagged crown that shown from his brow, and a sceptre which was heavy and little more than a heavy mace. It was quite clear that the king was no longer running the kingdom. His once proud head hung and his gaze rarely left the polished floor. Lines of magic threaded themselves through the dwarven king’s aura and seemed to be feeding from him.

The entire procession marched pasted Kara and Snark and didn’t seem to notice anything at all amiss.

Kolbolds! Her fingers quickly flashed in front of his face. What the hell are kolbolds doing here?

He shrugged. How the hell am I supposed to know? He signed. I think the better question would be, what are they up to and how can we get in on the action?

Kara crossed her arms and glared at him.

Isn’t it obvious?

Okay, dumb ass. Her fingers flashed. Explain.

Snark sighed. Dwarves in general do tend to have a lot of coin. While it is true that they don’t mine a lot of it, they do mine a lot of other metals. Iron, copper, silver and of course mithril. Mithril is worth more than gold. We shouldn’t forget that people pay a hell of a lot for dwarven crafted weapons. Even the stuff that the dwarves throw away as junk is far better than what the most skilled blacksmith can make.

Her eyes went back to the scaly bat like creatures. So, she replied. They are here for pretty much the same reason we are.

Pretty much. He agreed. But hey. This doesn’t change anything. We are still trapped here. The entire dwarven nation is still hunting the city and the countryside for us. That hasn’t changed, though I suspect that we had disrupted their plans by swiping the idol.

What are we going to do now?

Snark grinned. Did you see the size of that diamond?

Kara’s sudden grin matched his own. And that crown looked pretty shiny too. I don’t think that the king really needs it anymore now that the kolbolds are running things.

They took extra care as they moved away from the door. Kolbolds in more civilized lands are seen as brutish creatures, and for the most part that was true, it was never a good idea to underestimate them, or dismiss them as purely vermin. Those ears of theirs could hear almost as well as the bats that they resembled and they were known to have powerful shaman’s among them.

Snark knew for a fact that there was one close by. He didn’t know the purpose of the lines of energy that snaked through the stone around them; there was no way for him to know, but it was a good solid guess that it wasn’t anything good.

Shuffling steps echoed from the stone around them. Snark grabbed Kara and pulled her with him through the nearest door.

“Mine!” A high pitched squeaky voice protested.

They slowly turned around.

A short kolbold stood in the centre of the room with a dwarven child dangling from his arms. Blood pooled around the creature’s feet and soaked into the rug. Small limbs and the occasional torso were piled high off to one side. In the farthest corner from the grim scene, a dwarven woman was bound hand and foot. She struggled fiercely against the ropes that bound her while a small group of children cowered behind her.

The kolbold dropped the corpse. Snark flinched. “They were given to me,” The kolbold pounded on his chest. “Grimloch. Grimloch the bold. Grimloch the sneaky. You no take them.”

The Grimloch creature pulled a squealing infant from the arms of its sibling and cooed as he caressed the child’s head. He opened his mouth wide revealing jagged teeth and moved to pierce the baby’s skull.

Kara let fly. Her dagger buried itself to the hilt in the kolbold’s eye. Instantly Snark rush forward and caught the babe before the body could hit the floor. He breathed a sigh of relief as he cradled it in his arms and looked the little one over.

“I bloody well hate kolbolds,” Kara muttered under her breath. She plucked her blade from the cooling body and wiped it clean on it’s rags.

Snark looked up from the baby in his arms and glanced at the group of dwarves. “So much for not being seen. What should we do about them?”

Kara shrugged. “Leave them as they are. We can’t take them with us and we can’t let them roam about on their own. They would just raise the alarm to our presence and they probably would just get eaten by the kolbolds out there.”

The dwarf maid squealed and shook her head vigorously. She tried to tell them something around the gag that was clenched between her teeth.

Snark blinked. “I think that she can understand us.” He stepped closer to get a better look at her. “You know, this might be the queen.”

“Really?” Kara went over to stand beside him. “Are you sure?”

“I am pretty sure.” He replied. “No servant or underling would wear any of those jewels. That ruby is flawless. I think that is diamond dust in the grooves of those hair things that she is wearing.”

“Clips.” Kara corrected him. “They are called hair clips.”

“Whatever.” Snark brushed the hair from the dwarf’s eyes. “That is a royal circlet. If that isn’t a sign of royalty them I am a orcish bard.”

Kara snickered. “You are an orcish thief. That is almost the same thing.”

Snark leaned over the queen and examined the ropes that bound her. He adjusted them, making them both more comfortable for the dwarf and more secure at the same time.

“It’s too bad that we have to leave them here.” Snark said. “We can’t afford to get caught and between the kolbolds and the children, she is going to have more than enough to worry about than what we are up to.”

“What are we going to do with this little guy?” Kara waved her hand at the baby in his arms.

Snark looked around the room. “Give me a few moments.”

It didn’t take long for the pair of them to scrap together a make shift bed for the babe. They placed it next to the queen and placed the now drowsy child within it.

After that was done, Snark pulled a spare dagger from his boot and thrust it into a near by table. One that was just out of the queen’s reach. Kara arched a brow. “Are you sure that you are not going to need that?”

“No.” He replied. “But she is going to need something in case one of those kolbolds wander in here looking for their buddy over there. If she is smart, she will get herself and those children some where safe as soon as she manages to get herself free, and forget that we were here at all. I don’t want to leave her defenceless. I am just buying us some time. We should be long gone before she has managed to cut herself free.”

“Makes sense.” Kara shrugged.

He turned towards the door, then stopped. “Just one more thing before we go.” Snark smiled at the queen and her eyes narrowed. “I think that we should take our reward for saving them now. Since, we have no intention of ever coming back this way.”

Kara nodded and went to listen at the door. Snark’s slender fingers plucked the circlet from the queen’s brow. He held it up to admire it a moment before adding it to the idol that was stowed in his bag. Her rings and the golden chain that held the ruby quickly followed. The worry and desperation in the dwarf’s eyes quickly turned to astonishment, then rage.

Snark merely shrugged at her expression. “Nothing is free in this world. This is a small price to pay for the life of the little one. Don’t you think so?”

The dwarven queen snarled at him.

“Are you done yet?” Kara asked. “I can hear movement in the corridor. We have to get our asses out of here before we get pinned down.”

“All done.” Snark saluted the queen and turned away. “Time to move on.”

The dwarf screeched at him as he silently slipped through the door leaving her and the children behind.