Powered By Blogger

Inspirational Reads

"We Will Have War in the Morning"

May 16, 2007


That's the line I just finished writing. It's the last line of dialog one of my characters says at the end of Chapter 27. I added about two pages after that dealing with other characters, but it pretty much captures the same image as those words uttered by the Regent as he tells the other nobles to prepare themselves: "This storm will blow itself out by the sun's first light; we will have war in the morning."

I dunno. It probably could be more powerful and gripping, but we're getting to the end of the book and so something has to take place, right? There can't be any more talk about the ensuing battle; the battle has to be fought at some point. (By the way, if you google "battle" under images, you get a lot of pictures of Transformers from some server at Ohio State...and a lot of scantily-clad ladies hanging out around yellow cars). The battle had better take place, especially since I've already started writing one of the three chapters that this battle is spread over.

I wasn't sure about that in the beginning when I mapped out the book, but it's pretty clear that the battle needs to take place in three stages and, mostly, from three different vantage points (since I have three main story arcs going). See, this will all make my wife very happy, since she feels that three is a perfect number (when we really all know it is 42)--in fact her favorite number is 27 (based on it being 3^3).

Speaking of 27, that's the chapter I just finished. Since I refused to trade off grading final exams in organic for someone else writing it, I felt the need to write it. That leaves only 23 (two pages written), 26 (zero pages written), 28 (zero pages written), 29 (zero pages written) and 30 (seven pages written) to go. What's that down there? Why it is, it's the light at the end of the tunnel.

By the numbers:
Word Count: 148,398
Page Count: 485

I'm not sure what chapter I'll work on next. Logic would say 30, since I have the most done on it, but 23 is a short chapter and it has work done on it, 26 is a short chapter, but has no work done on it, and 28 is a long chapter, has no work done on it, but is the natural continuation of chapter 27, and I have momentum coming out of 27. Maybe this will be another work on three or four chapters simultaneously type deals. Since those have worked out so well in the past. Look for more news at the end of the week. In the meantime, I'll try to make an actual post about something other than the world I've crafted (or one of them).

3 comments:

Chemgeek said...

"This storm will blow itself out by the sun's first light; we will have war in the morning."

That is a very nice line. I can imagine the speaker looking out over the horizon, taking a step towards the West, speaking the first part, pausing and turning to his commrades and speaking the rest. The dramatic pause after "light" sets the stage for all that follows.

Well done. I look forward to reading it in context.

the iNDefatigable mjenks said...

Thanks, I appreciate any criticism I get (especially the positive type).

I was actually trying to play with the symbolism, since storms are typically used as symbolism for war (i.e. George R. R. Martin's "Storm of Swords"). The storm will be gone, but there will be war.

I thought I was being clever. We'll see how it goes.

gledwood said...

They look like the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse!