Yearly Archives: 2018

Remembering Heroes and Sacrifices

In honor of D-Day this year I picked up a copy of the John C. McManus account of the 1st Division’s assault on the eastern section of Omaha Beach, The Dead and Those About to Die.

It’s an intense and gripping book, filled with detailed accounts of the harrowing obstacles and events, and tragedy and heroism. Just a great read, and full of examples of true leadership.

I had no idea that the men were so overloaded with equipment that it slowed them down. Time and again survivors reported that they had been weighed down with too much equipment, and felt that they wouldn’t have lost as many men if they could have moved faster. So many things went wrong — the aerial bombardment against German positions wasn’t very effective, the water was so choppy the special amphibious tanks sank, most of the boats were swept off course and into the worst possible places…

And yet somehow the men got off the beaches and took out the fortifications. In case you couldn’t already tell, this book has two thumbs up from yours truly. Highly recommended.

Updated Hard Writing Lesson: Word Count

I’ve run out of time to write a lengthy essay this morning about my fourth book, so I’ll resume that series of essays next week. Today I thought I’d draft a brief note about another writing matter that’s been a challenge to me for years: word count.

Like a lot of writers, once I got a steady writing gig I began to fret about my daily word count. It was always smaller than I wanted it to be. Some days I could get 4 or even 5 thousand words and occasionally much higher, but more often it was 3k or a little less. I last wrote about this in 2016, when I had realized that the overall weekly or even monthly word count was much more important than the daily word count.

That was an important realization, because it helped me stop getting frustrated every day when my words weren’t coming as fast as I thought they were supposed to arrive. I went so far as to read a number of books on writing faster to see if I could glean the secrets. I gleaned some, but I knew at that point that few writing tips are absolute. What works for one writer may not work for another — you have to be willing to try of course, but there are many different ways up the mountain.

Writer Chat: Nathan Long

I’ve known Nathan Long for many years and I happen to think he’s long been one of the finest sword-and-sorcery writers active today, which is why I invited him to submit a tale for the second issue of Tales From the Magician’s Skull, and why I’ve been telling people — for years — that they really need to read his Blackhearts books.

Nathan was kind enough to answer some questions about his work and the life of a writer, and I’m kind enough to share them with you.

Why don’t you give us a little background about yourself and your work?

I grew up in Pennsylvania and moved to Los Angeles after college to be a screenwriter. Though I had some minor successes, the Hollywood life grew less and less appealing, and when I was offered a chance to write novels for Warhammer, I jumped at the chance. Turned out novel writing was much more my speed, and I had a blast working in that world.

A few years later I managed to sell an original sci-fi novel and a sequel, and I thought I was on my way to a career as a novelist, but I had difficulty selling anything else, so I sought out other opportunities. Now I have the job my twelve-year-old self would have wanted, had it existed at the time. It’s the best job I’ve ever had. I write stories, dialog, and other bits and pieces for computer games.

The only downside is that I don’t do as much of my own writing anymore, but when your dream was to make a living as a writer and you’re making a living as a writer, you can’t really complain, can you?

Writing Notecards

Sometimes I re-learn writing lessons without pain. Or maybe I should say sometimes what I know is a good writing technique gets confirmed, because I actually remember to apply what I learned.

Yesterday I had to run a bunch of errands on the far side of town. I grabbed my writing notebook just in case… and when I took the wife’s car in for an oil change saw that I’d be waiting a loooong time, because there were so many customers ahead of me. No worries, because I had the writing notebook.

Even better, I had some index cards. I got more plotting done there waiting for the oil change than I’d managed in the last month. Sometimes you have to have the right tools at the right time.

The Black Hack 2.0

This is my first time mentioning The Black Hack, one of the MOST streamlined of fantasy role-playing games. Creative, intuitive, and short, The Black Hack took a new spin on the old D&D stats and settings and did very clever things with them. It inspired an entire movement of streamlined games, from pirate themed to space themed to horror themed to low-priced expansions and so on and so forth. It’s a great little system and can be had cheap ($2.00) through rpgnow right here. If you don’t believe me, read some reviews, or take the word of William King, creator of Gotrek and Felix, who was singing its praises to me earlier this week.

Bill’s also the fellow who pointed me towards the Kickstarter for the new, expanded edition of The Black Hack, which you can find here. Looks pretty groovy, and it, too, is stunningly affordable. I mean, look at the price for the complete PDF edition!

If you’re a long time gamer you really owe it to yourself to check it out. I’m going to sell off some stuff I’m never going to play again so I can “splurge” for the print edition. (I use “splurge” lightly, as the print edition before shipping is still only $40.)

Novel Lessons 3: The Bones of the Old Ones

Three weeks ago I mentioned that it had taken me a year, writing in my spare time, to create the first Dabir and Asim novel, The Desert of Souls. Well, when it came to its sequel, it took just as long, even though I was writing full time. Sadly, it proved one of the most challenging books I’ve yet written, even though up until the most recent, unpublished novel, For The Killing of Kings, it was my favorite and the one of which I was most proud.

What went wrong? Well, that’s where the lessons come in.

First, I thought that my skeletal outline method was the way to go. It turns out that worked just fine for the first book, which was an origin story. I wanted to do something more complex with the second book now that my main characters were brothers in all but blood, and a wiser man than me should have realized that meant he needed a more complicated outline. I sure wish I could talk to that guy, because he would have saved himself and his poor, long suffering wife a whole lot of anguish.

You see, I ended up writing The Bones of the Old Ones no less than three times from almost start to finish. That certainly wasn’t my intent. Nearly everything about the plot changed apart from the general concept and the first three or four chapters. I had a strong beginning scene, but I cut it early on, and it took my wife and my editor, Pete Wolverton, some serious convincing to get me back to that start when I began it the third time.

Second, I only had a vague idea about my villains. I THOUGHT I knew them better than I did, but I was so eager to get started that I hadn’t thought them through very clearly. As a result I didn’t completely know their powers, or even their motivations. That was, frankly, an idiot move, because the middle got really muddy when I didn’t have an idea how the bad guys would be reacting to what was happening.

Writer Chat: Aeryn Rudel

Recently the talented Aeryn Rudel was kind enough to answer a slew of questions from me. I met Aeryn when he joined issue 1 to Tales From the Magician’s Skull. Not only did I enjoy his story, I’ve enjoyed all of our interactions. He’s a friendly and insightful guy and has been a big help behind the scenes. Here, get to know him a little yourself as I ask him some questions.

First, why don’t you give us a little background about yourself and your work?

I’m a California kid currently weathering the rain and gloom in the Pacific Northwest and working as a freelance writer. I got my start in game design, writing for companies like Goodman Games and Wizards of the Coast. From there I switched to publishing, and I worked as a magazine editor and then as the managing editor for Privateer Press’ fiction line. So, I’ve seen the biz from both the editing and the writing side of things.

My writing tends toward horror and dark fantasy, and most of my work falls somewhere in or between those two genres, though I have been known to dabble with science fiction (and even mystery). While I enjoy writing long-form fiction, the short story is probably my favorite, especially flash fiction (stories under 1,000 words).

Doomsday Music

So here’s a cool thing. If you’re a musician, or music scholar, and happen also to be a fan of the original Star Trek, boy, do I have a link for you.

I’ve long said that the original Star Trek had some of the finest, most memorable music for any television series, ever. I’ve sometimes wondered if it’s so hummable just because I’m used to it, having seen the shows so many times, but I don’t think that’s the real story. There truly was gripping background music tracked through the first two seasons, and among the finest was the music originally composed for my favorite episode, “The Doomsday Machine,” and used in numerous episodes thereafter.

Mighty Warriors Arrive

My brand new copy of The Mighty Warriors turned up in the post yesterday. I can’t remember when I had a NEW anthology chock full of sword-and-sorcery. I mean, I’ve had old anthologies that were new to me, but not one that was hot off the presses.

I’ve been friends with two of the authors for years, Charles Rutledge and Paul McNamee. Charles is the fellow who spoke so highly of Shotokan karate and therefore helped me choose which school to attend many years back (and I’m STILL there). I’ve known Paul since I used to edit the old Flashing Swords e-zine. He helped manage the related web site for a while when I was busy with grad school. Yet I’ve never read any of their work! Now I have the chance, because they both have a story in the volume, along with one of my favorite writers, Charles Saunders, my friend David C. Smith. There’s also work by friendly acquaintances and industry standard bearers. I’ve been hearing good things about Adrian Cole’s Elak pastiches for a while, so I’m particularly interested to see what he’s cooked up.

Anyway, I’m pleased to have a copy and eager to get to reading. Your own copies can be found here.

Novel Lessons 2: Plague of Shadows

Maybe I should label this novel as “2.5” because I’d started my second Dabir and Asim novel, The Bones of the Old Ones, before I set to work on Plague of Shadows. But I set Bones aside and gave this one my attention all through the summer.

I didn’t write it as I’d written my first novel, in part because as a work-for-hire, I had to present an extremely detailed outline and get it approved before I started working. That meant I had a pretty solid blueprint, even though that blueprint ended up changing a lot as I went. It was a little harder than my first novel, but not so hard as the next one would be, probably because of that outline, one that a talented editor had provided me with feedback for.

Why was it a little more difficult? Well, the characters and their relationships were all brand new to me, so it took a little writing and rewriting to get used to them and how they’d react, something I hadn’t had to do much with The Desert of Souls.

The most obvious lesson in writing Plague was to be flexible. Somehow I managed to roll with the punches on this one far faster than I’d roll with challenges in later books. I was about a third of the way into the draft, about 30 thousand words, when I heard from James Sutter. James, by the way, is a great editor — and a talented writer as well — and this wasn’t at all his typical way of communicating. But the Paizo Pathfinder novel line was new, and they were still working on marketing. He said that they had realized that novels with dragons on the cover sold better and asked if I could work some dragons into the plot. I said sure, I already had one, but he wondered if I could have a big fight with a dragon. So I said sure, why not? And I found a way, and I think it ended up strengthening the book.