Wednesday 14 March Report (Previous Report)
Word Target: 2,500
Words Written: 2,508
- Overview
Crucible continues to showcase a myriad of good ideas I never thought I had in my brain. Each week provides a new chance for me to prove myself a competent writer – not that I am not to other people, but I don’t have the same impression of myself as others do. While I do enjoy my other novels, something about Crucible seems to work, derivative as it might be.
I realise it is bad to call one’s own work derivative, but that’s the truth with any novel these days. There are no new stories, so we borrow from the works of other people to craft our worlds and our stories. Mythology and folk tales are the main targets of derivation in novels, but that allows those tales to live on for a thousand more years.
- What I Did Today
Most of today focused on having Ash work on conditioning Lumi through a series of “tests.” The essence of these tests is not yet known to the reader, but the entire scene leads into the first true reciprocal romantic encounter of Ash and Lumi in nothing more than a simple kiss. That’s all it needed to be, and it marks the perfect place to begin the transition into the middle act of the novel.
- The Best Sample From Today
For today, I chose two paragraphs of dialogue by Ash that gives the first real glimpse beyond the exterior of Ash and gives the reader a sense of her history. It is difficult to get the backstory of characters perfect, but the way I wrote the sequences relies on allowing the reader to perform the actions along with Lumi.
Sample 1
“It’s amazing what the darkness does to us, isn’t it, Lumi? Not only is a dark place the perfect hiding spot for things we wish to keep locked away, but it is where our demons congregate and gather their power. I like to think of the darkness as an exercise. It’s a place where we can improve our skills without people laughing at our faults. Without our eyesight, people say we cannot fight. We are more than our sight though. We have the ability to feel our surroundings. Come, take a step closer and feel the air. Spin around and let the air flow through your fingers, get a feel for it,” I heard Ash say.
This is the opening for the whole conditioning sequence. It might not be a long part of the novel as it tops maybe three and a half pages, but it is vital to show. It helps the reader understand how Ash intends to break down Lumi’s defences and morph the Haven-dweller into what amounts to a pawn.
A pawn is not a bad thing though. In my youth, I was a champion chess player (my tournament attendance might only be 1, but my record is 6 wins, 0 losses and 1 draw) and I know the value of a pawn in that game. In fact, a lot of my chess wins hinged on a single pawn turning the tide. Crucible is like a game of Gambit Chess. The characters act in a certain way, but there is always a wildcard present on the field.
Sample 2
“Stop your spin. You need to keep your equilibrium intact. Breathe in the air and feel how full it makes your chest. Feel the freshness and pick up the scents of a bygone era. Focus hard enough and you will figure out where I have stood in this room and you will be able to follow without any problems. Your eyes lie about a lot of things. Your nose will never lie about a scent. I learned that the night I killed the people who tortured me after they killed my parents. They could not see me coming for they relied too much on their eyes. Come on. Use your sense of smell and what your body feels to navigate around. Do not rely on your touch. The air on your skin is far more reliable than any physical object. I want you to move like a shadow. Show me how you smell and feel,” Ash whispered.
I have a strong connection with disabilities in my life, and the purpose of the entire sensory test sequence was to show that even without the use of a particular sense, a human can still operate at optimal capacity. In fact, I believe a human without their eyes can “see” better than someone with all five senses.
- How Productive I Felt I Was
Today was a unique bottle episode for me, but it revealed a lot more about me and continued the trend that Crow started as I continue to improve my confidence and writing ability. Today was equal parts dialogue and action lines, but they don’t work against each other. They complement each other and really improve the story being told in the words I wrote today.
This week was precisely what I said I would do last week. I tested the characters and continued to lay the seeds for one of the ultimate goals of Crucible – that being the romance between Ash and Lumi. My confidence is really high and I continue to stay within a consistent finish time for my word count.
- What I Intend To Write Next Week
Next week will continue the trip to Laas Neda and build toward the definitive end of Act One. It also increases the stakes that Ash and Lumi face – they have one less day to find and activate the Crucible before Cataclysm arrives for the second time.
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