I’ve said it before. I’ll say it again, I’m not a fast writer. I don’t need a W.A. group to announce my failings or hope for inspiration or intercession to make the statement false. It is what it is.
I appreciate sincerely everything that is being done to assist me in getting Kingdoms to print. I appreciate too, the methodology being used to make it happen and make sure that all the proverbial bases get covered. I do not have any intention however of converting to become a plotter. The temptation has reared its vapid head and called; I am declining the charges.
NO, this is not to say that I am being pressured, coerced or in any way asked to change my methodology. I am stating for the record, for myself, that I will be true to my style and to my work methods. I am a big enough person to know when I need to ask for help, and I am not so proud or arrogant to skip that step if it is merited. It is how Kingdoms will get to press and into the reader’s hands who have been waiting. For that, it is both necessary, and well-merited.
I can express my appreciation for a process and not be compelled to use it. The wall of magic sticky notes is intriguing. The way that they bounce to words and word count gains is impressive too. For me, it is just too sterile. I need to feel the pen in my hand and the roll of it as the ink swirls across a clean page. I need to wear the battle scars of the pen that fought to keep the last word or letter in the barrel as I was working away, but gave its last full measure of devotion to get it out before it died a quick end on the next sentence and had to be replaced. I need to see the pages of labor accumulate on the table stand as the next warrior to fall in the battle for the book steps up to take its lashings of ink.
Some pages die faster than others and become part of the inky casualty of my brain downloading through my fingertips. Others die slowly, so slowly that it is more like a dance between hesitant lovers than a battle to keep gaining in the war. Either way, there is a perfect beauty to the creation process this way for me. The feeling is completely different and extremely foreign to fill a wall with colorful squares, and then type the tale into a formatted file that will be ready to go to the publisher should it pass the betas and editors.
Writing for me is a warm, brilliant, super nova event where ideas cataclysm to reveal new words, characters, and ideas. This process is valid and obviously has extreme merits for those who use it, I just don’t believe that I can. Kingdoms is my compromise for the sake of getting the work into print and out where it needs to be. It is not my conversion. -Aedan
Recent Comments