Friday

I've felt better. Could be allergies or simply end-of-week malaise. Treated myself to a Buffy fix in an effort to perk up. "What's My Line," Parts 1 and 2. It kinda worked.

Pardon whilst I sneeze--

Ok. It's allergies.

Fiddling over a scene. Jani and Torin, arguing--they're not getting along well in this book.

There are no easy scenes in the fifth book of a five-book series. Not that scenes are ever easy, but now the rug is pretty much woven and it's a question of finding just the right colors of yarn to fill in the increasingly narrow gaps. Hiding the seams. Trying not to disrupt the pattern.

Something that I thought/hoped would turn out to be an easy paragraph or three of bickering turned into something else. I was typing merrily along during lunch yesterday, erasing sentences and starting over, when a couple of lines just sort of fell out onto the page and I realized that no, this is not a simple argument. This touches on Jani's past/present and Torin's future as an archivist/reporter/whatever he is. This is Jani Instructing and Torin Wishing she'd shut up. This is Jani realizing how much trouble others would like to maneuver her into. Now comes the next chapter or so, where she says hell with it and walks into it, eyes wide open.

Still to come, a lesson in how you can behave exactly as others expect you to, and still surprise them.

Friday

I've felt better. Could be allergies or simply end-of-week malaise. Treated myself to a Buffy fix in an effort to perk up. "What's My Line," Parts 1 and 2. It kinda worked.

Pardon whilst I sneeze--

Ok. It's allergies.

Fiddling over a scene. Jani and Torin, arguing--they're not getting along well in this book.

There are no easy scenes in the fifth book of a five-book series. Not that scenes are ever easy, but now the rug is pretty much woven and it's a question of finding just the right colors of yarn to fill in the increasingly narrow gaps. Hiding the seams. Trying not to disrupt the pattern.

Something that I thought/hoped would turn out to be an easy paragraph or three of bickering turned into something else. I was typing merrily along during lunch yesterday, erasing sentences and starting over, when a couple of lines just sort of fell out onto the page and I realized that no, this is not a simple argument. This touches on Jani's past/present and Torin's future as an archivist/reporter/whatever he is. This is Jani Instructing and Torin Wishing she'd shut up. This is Jani realizing how much trouble others would like to maneuver her into. Now comes the next chapter or so, where she says hell with it and walks into it, eyes wide open.

Still to come, a lesson in how you can behave exactly as others expect you to, and still surprise them.