Wednesday, May 11, 2005
You know, it's proof enough that, for all it's many virtues, IMDB is a haven to idgits and assholes that Barton Fink has a paltry 7.5 "user rating." I mean, really, why must something so useful be plagued with idgits and assholes all voicing there frelling opinions? Isn't that why the nameless gods created LiveJournal? 7.5? Barton Fink? Some people...
So, now Daughter of Hounds has been plotted, scene by scene, all the way through the end of Chapter Seven (of twelve chapters). I cannot tell you how weird it is to be writing a book this way. Writers should not be precognizant, but here I know what's going to happen, in detail, long before it does. I mean, I probably won't be writing Chapter Seven until July, but I already know what happens. But this had become necessary. I want this book to be exactly right, more exactly right than those before it, and I don't have all the time in the world, and I need to stay under 150K words, and when you put all that stuff together, well, this was necessary. Each chapter now has at least one big ol' index card (Chapter Six has two) detailing the events to occur there. Crib notes. Spooky wrote them out while I prattled on. That took the better part of yesterday. And today I will sit down and begin rewriting Chapter Three from Emmie's POV, extending its scope from Saturday night to Saturday night and Sunday, and reducing Sadie Jasper from a major character to a supporting role. Rebuilding. Rethinking. Realizing an unrealized reality. Whatever. I've told Bill Schafer that he'll have the finished ms. for his edition by the end of September; my deadline with Roc isn't until December 1st, but I have other things to write in October and November.
I had a good conversation with my agent on Monday. Sometimes, she's the angel who talks me down off ledges and other high places. Monday was a day like that. We discussed the possibility that Daughter of Hounds might be my last full-length "adult" novel for a while. I've been giving some thought to writing YA (Young Adult) novels, and she was very encouraging towards that end. We also talked about how Entertainment Weekly reviews don't frelling sell books, how it sucks being a mid-list author in the age of The Big Book, how most parents have no idea what their children are reading, and so forth. Anyway, this is yet another reason that I'm taking so much care with Daughter of Hounds (originally conceived as YA, by the way), because it may well be my last book of this sort for a time (but not forever).
The page-proofs for To Charles Fort, With Love just arrived on my doorstep. There's more work...
What about last night? Hmmm. Spooky cooked a huge pot of vegetarian chili. We're reading To Kill a Mockingbird aloud, just because I wanted to, I haven't read it since at least high school. Oh, to have been the sort of author that Harper Lee was — write one utterly perfect novel, then write no more. I drew 17 monster doodles which I shall colour tonight. I played Doom 3 until my eyes were bleeding. The enviroments in this game are so beautiful. I wish they were a little more interactive, but they are beautiful. Zipping along the monorail beneath a Martian sandstorm, for example, or that goddamned reactor chamber. Wow. And now I know how Hell broke loose on Mars. I almost shot the teleporter engineer when he confessed the whole thing to me. I should have shot him, but I needed him to run the fool thing. Oh, and the latest piercing, the guiche, has gone so well that I'm considering my first tattoos now. I'm thinking I'll begin this summer.
Okay. Enough of this for one damn day. I have to write. And remember, kiddos, Silk for only $5! How can you possibly pass that up? Buy a copy for your mother. Go. Now. Spend.
12:33 PM
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