ieva melgalve » worldbuilding

overclocked

ieva — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 08:00:24 +0000

Here we go. The past week is catching up on me eventually, and I have very little choice in what to do. I guess my mode of operation will be “to hang on until I can’t hang on any more and see what happens then”. This has actually worked quite fine before, so probably it’ll be OK.
Flowers are approaching the finale slowly (I have two pages left, and they seem to stretch forever now). But it feels like a good, solid work this far, so I’m quite happy with it.
Planning isn’t going as planned. (Horrible pun intended.) It seems that I either have to figure out a good way to plan a culture without bogging it down with unnecessary details (ie details that have no emotional resonance in me, or any relevance to the story), or just switch back to character planning which seemed to give me good ideas.
Also, there’s that writers’ group I have to attend to. So the very necessary time off will have to wait.

the first words

ieva — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 20:03:47 +0000

My idea to have a first draft before any serious worldbuilding is working out nicely. Well, it isn’t technically a “first draft”, it is, so far, unattached semi-scenes, more of a setup than a reality, glimpses into the world. However, I’m writing 300 words a day average (well, at least I should be writing; I haven’t met my today’s goal yet), and these glimpses give me more and better insights into the world than I ever got while planning. And, had I planned it before as I thought I would, I would have it incredibly more boring (for me at least, and my own interest is all that matters at this moment).

I got my protagonist, although she’s still a bit stiff or raw or whiny or–I don’t know what’s wrong with her, but she has no real, likeable voice yet.
I have my antagonist or probably lover, I don’t know that yet either. He hasn’t said anything yet but I am fascinated already.
I got a setting that’s more than good vs evil. That piece of information came to me in a state between sleep and wakefullness, and I absolutely adore it because it’s so, well, true.

I haven’t figured out yet the magic. I migh swap the two different types of magic usage between the two cultures.

I’m excited. And still sleepy. And reluctant to actually put any words on paper.

But I know I can now, and it feels way more healthy than anything I’ve had since end of November.

novel creation plan

ieva — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 09:16:40 +0000

So the last post left me & The Virgin in a rough-rough idea state, with a vague impression of a protagonist and magic system. The next day, I jotted down very simple bulletpoint lists about the protagonist and magic system (known things and possible spin-off ideas, noted as “weird stuff”–the places where the gray areas of magic are clearly visible, since keeping them in mind early on will enhance the story while ignoring them until the end would most likely damage it).
I tried to pin down the theme&tone and the protagonist as a personality, not just a cipher and a problem. The theme seemed to be all right, for starters. At some point, I figured out why I liked my initial idea, and noted it, mainly because it is tricky and I might grow disgusted with it pretty soon if I don’t do it with the necessary grace.
The protagonist was a problem though. I simply don’t have her before I actually start writing her. I can have the problems all right, and the stakes and everything that’s under the skin, but I can’t really describe the “skin” part of her yet. It’ll take at least one scene to get her down (and yes, I have a short and dreamy one).
Next steps–developing culture and more characters, as well as refining the magic system. (Really, I have the *system* but I have zero idea what it actually does. I’m like an engineer looking at wired-together something and determining whether it’ll work or not, but I don’t know if it’s a washing machine or the world elimination engine.)

the first glimpse

ieva — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 09:21:41 +0000

More than a week ago, I was putting the lil one to sleep, both of us dozing off, her hands in mine, and I thought–this is the feeling I want to write about.
Then I thought–what if it wasn’t even my child, and the feeling remained? What if I pretended to be her mother?
Now why would I do that? Hmmm, perhaps I want to pretend I have a kid because I’m a virgin. Why would somebody want to go such lengths and have such a tricky setup just to pretend she’s not a virgin?
Well, perhaps it’s a world where virginity poses danger to women…
But why not get rid of it the easy way then?

And so the story was born, the OMG it’s so creepy, it’s so thrilling idea. I fell asleep and had a dream that involved the usual NaNo writing and everything, and at the end of the dream, I grabbed a pen and started writing my idea down frantically. The same idea.
Then I woke up, panicked that it would be lost, and typed up it in a few words.

That’s how a story is born.

my personal progress

ieva — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 06:36:14 +0000

I’m working steadily on my NaNoWriMo novel, and here’s one thing that I think I have learned from writing Vega: I am less afraid to confront my characters with the reality of my novel’s world.
I think that I myself am always a bit reluctant to press on the reality, question it, study it harder. It’s because, basically, when I was a kid I wasn’t sure at all the world was real, so I was afraid that if I push it too hard then I might just break it and end up in a weird dream-world of no rules, and there’d be no way out of that. (I guess that’s another way of saying “I was afraid I might go crazy”).
Anyhow, my NaNoWriMo characters aren’t that way. They are risking it, they want to peek over the edge of the world even if what they see might boggle their minds, even if there really isn’t anything over the edge of the world, while I keep building frantically onward where they look.

Writing a weird and fascinating thing.

breaking down my day

ieva — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 22:51:39 +0000

800+ words written in Vega and some things scribbled down for world-building because I suddenly needed laws and punishments for mages. I made them laughably simple though (as in fifth and final law: “Do not fail when killing another mage”).
I also did some beautiful language stuff on Keir. Somehow, I’m not that interested in actual words than in their etymology (thank you, Mr. Spellchecker), the one that ties my males to a root meaning “to give; to give away; to lose”. I did not intentionally name them “losers”, I swear.

Otherwise, a crazy, kid-beridden day when I can’t even hear myself thinking. (Or perhaps I have ceased thinking altogether.)

early birdie

ieva — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 11:53:44 +0000

600+ words today, and I’m well over my weekly goal already (still having Saturday and Sunday to go). I am going to do some work on Keir today and perhaps write later in the evening when I have figured out what exactly to write. I am uncertain whether I’m running bloody short or bloody long on Vega; things are advancing all the time and while I have stuff planned, it’s hard to feel the “thickness” of it.
It will take a lot of planning to do Keir right. My “good day” wordcount is 1100+ while staying somewhat coherent, to do 12500 words a week I’ll have to find a way to make a workable outline that would be flexible enough for me. And worldbuilding enough to sustain me with cultural trivia when I won’t be able to push things forth.
Worldbuilding is a funny thing though. It’s a blast to do it, but it seems that for me, not building much of it works even better. I have used just a little of what I “built” but every chapter, I’m digging up stuff from the history of Bruga and the way magic works.

hit the brakes, hit the brakes!

ieva — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 07:40:27 +0000

I’m at some breathtaking point in my writing where I feel my head spinning and for the third day in a row, I’m promising myself not to write today and give myself a break. Yea right.
Well, zero words written this far.
However what I promised myself was doing some outlining and some rounding-up of the magic system.
I rounded up the magic in 30 minutes while going to work and while I did it, headlights kicked in and now I know
- the problem for the next chapter (I’ll have to tweak my yesterday’s writing to do this, but it’s OK, it was weak anyways), and the problem is, well, not bigger than all the rest of them but this time, it has an opportunity to hit Vega where it really hurts and unexpectedly so,
- the setting of the next chapter (yea, I had a vague idea that they could sit around at the library, figuring out what’s happening. The *library*. Not gonna happen, no-no-no),
- the emotional strife for Vega (and that’s a bad one too),
- (and while Vega and Daar are out of sight, there will be things for both of my charming villains to do. I’m still trying to figure out whether I need their viewpoint or not.)
So what to do about these throbbing fingers?

I can sorta edit the Mermaid. I think that the most crits are in and I have a pretty clear image of what I want to accomplish.
Perhaps some brainstorming of the upcoming NaNo.
Or (ohcrap) that review I promised to write. Yea. That’s what I have to do.