Writerly Wednesday: Fiction!

As I mentioned Monday night, this is a crazy week for me.  I did not get the spreadsheet of taxes done that I needed to get done tonight last night.  And, well, a lot of stuff still needs to be got done.

So!

How about some fiction?  You've heard me talk about Kelpie, how about a taste?  It's a rough draft, so it will change, so I'm not particularly worried about having published this tidbit on the Internet because it will be different from the end product.

It's near the beginning, but the opening is weak.  What you need to know (and what I need to rewrite) is that the narrator, 11-year-old Heather, is riding the family Shire stud, Opulent Majesty, with her best friend (and a prince of England) 12-year-old Joseph.  They snuck away from his bodyguards and are set on investigating the disappearance of some children at the loch abutting the family property.  Having watched enough TV (telly) and read enough books, they are quite sure they'll find some grand clue that the trained professionals missed.  They're right - but in the worst way possible!

            Beneath us, Oppie, full name Opulent Majesty, gave a little hop and a shake.  I gripped his mane, and Joe gripped me, breathing word I knew was a curse in Arabic.  It was a long fall from a 20-hand horse.

            "We're almost to the loch," he said.  "Let's walk."

            "Ok." 

            I let him slide down first, then followed. 

            Oppie pranced nervously, something I'd never seen him do, and curled his lips back, scenting the air.  It should have been a hint, but I didn't listen.  Instead, I wrapped his lead rope around a lower hanging bough so he wouldn't leave us.  We weren't planning to be long, but I made sure to clip it under his chin rather than to the training rings in case we were a few minutes and he kept up with his freaky behavior.  I didn't want to hurt the poor horse.

            We'd ridden to the loch via the route that actually had some trees, and we could see the glimmering water up ahead.  It was only a few steps to the edge of the treeline.

            "What's the plan?" Joe asked, heading towards the loch.

            "Look for clues to find the kids who went missing that the fuzz missed, figure out where they are, and be heroes."

Joe put a hand on my shoulder and stopped walking.  "You hear that?"

            "What?" I asked, smirking at the cliché.

            "Yuh… exactly," he frowned, clearly not intending any cliché.  I listened, and it was dead quiet.  No birds, nothing.  Except for Oppie's nervous stomping behind us.

            Then a soft slosh of water, as if someone were just getting out from a swim.  I looked at Joe, then jogged around the hillock that blocked part of my view.  Then froze.

            It smelled of low tide and sea beds and dead things, which was far too strong for this partial-salt loch.  Rings rippled out from a bunch of seaweed moving towards the shore.  It slipped from the water, stepping up, revealing the weed-covered body of a horse.

            Not quite a horse.  The nightmare of a horse.  It curled its lips back, flushing as stallions do.  Beneath the greenish black lips were sharp, wolfish teeth.  Not the teeth of the gentle herbivores. 

            Its eyes reflected – or glowed – red in the sun.

            "Heather…?" Joe's voice trembled, and he took my arm, pulling me back towards the trees.

            Behind us, Oppie screamed.  There was a crack like thunder, and the ground quaked from hoofbeats.  As he galloped towards us, his head was pulled down from the bough that dragged behind him, tangled in the lead rope.

            His baritone scream echoed again, and he stopped just behind us.  He lowered his head, arching his back almost like a stalking cat.  Nostril's flared, he wove towards us, neck extended like a snake crawling through grass.  His posture sent shivers up my spine.  Where was that sweet horse I knew?  Despite being the only stallion, no horse on our property was more gentle!  And now I was terrified of him.

            A grunt and growl behind us yanked our attention to the other… creature.  A kelpie.  It matched Oppie's posture and was twice as terrifying with its hellish appearance. 

            The two circled around us.

            The water horse charged first.

            Joe yanked me out of the way, and we both fell to the ground.

            The ground quaked with 2500 kilos of furious stallion hoofbeats.  Oppie's black dinner plate hoof planted only a breath from our faces.  We both choked gasps.  Lily, my sister, had received a Reserve rank in dressage with our beast-sized stallion.  Knowing how well he could do precision footwork didn't matter.

            Not when he faced off against the seaweed black monstrosity that emerged from the loch.

            Where my parents and Joseph's parents – the crowned prince and princess of England, making it a royal decree - told us not to go.

            The kelpie reared.  Opulent Majesty, my family's shire stallion, towered over us like a guardian monster.  Protecting the stupid human youths of his herd.  The limb – not a branch - I'd thrown his lead around because he'd danced nervously around the tree line kept him from reaching the apex of his rear, but didn't lessen the terrifying effect.

            Oppie, himself, hadn't even wanted to come.

            Prince Joseph and I just wanted to explore, maybe embody those twelve-year-old sleuths in Mum's books that were old books when Mum was my age.

            It was my idea.

            God, I was stupid, and it'd be my fault if we died right here.

            The kelpie lunged.  Defying physics, Oppie twisted and hammered his back legs into the charging kelpie that was about the size of Mom's Percheron cross.  The kick pounded the kelpie to the ground where it threw up dirt, flailing its own massive hooves feathered with water weed fetlocks.  Momentum flew the broken limb.  It landed on the ground, digging in, wedging beneath a rock.  The shire lunged at the fallen water horse, but the pinned limb anchored him.  His baritone scream rang sick in my stomach.

            I crawled towards the limb and rock.

            "Heather! What are you doing?" Joseph hissed at me, following.

            "He's stuck," I said.  I was the idiot who'd wrapped the lead line that ended up tangled.  I yanked the knife from my work boot and sawed at the lead rope.  Oppie bounced a few times, posturing as the kelpie got back to its feet.  It circled, tail up, snorting.  It wasn't going to back off.

            Oppie's dark eye flicked towards me, even as his attention never left the water horse.  He snorted, arching his neck, puffing his chest and flicking his tail.  He stomped closer to the kelpie as the my knife cut through the lead.  The stallion jumped forward the moment I severed the last threads. 

            I tumbled back as Oppie went on the offensive.  The kelpie reared, turning, but not losing ground, still blocking our way from the woods we'd come from.  Oppie didn't charge; he stayed near Joseph and me, blocking the water horse from us.  Both equines, mortal and fae, paced and sized each other up.

            Oppie's push left us room to get to our feet without eight oversized hooves dancing around us.  Though Joseph was on his feet first, I followed too soon for him to even offer a hand.

            "Now what?" he asked, eyes glued on Oppie and the kelpie.

            "I… don't know."

            The kelpie charged again.  I could see it favoring the hip that Oppie had kicked, and it was furious.  Its eyes glowed orange red, flickering like flames and the afternoon sun gave the slick black coat a slimy green sheen.  Nostrils flared steam, and its long muzzle pointed more than any horse breed I knew. 

            Freed from the limb, Oppie hopped to the side of the oncoming charge and pulled himself up to his full height at a rear, beating towards the kelpie's skull.  His white fetlocks fluttered like avenging angel wings so high Joseph and I had to strain to see, even as we backed further away.  The kelpie veered away and tried to circle around.

It shifted its fiery gaze from Oppie to us and sneered, revealing carnivorous, blood-rust teeth stained green at the gums.  The shire landed, turned tightly and pushed back at the faerie.

"Trees!" I pointed.  Joseph nodded.  We darted that direction.  The kelpie was faster.  In a rollback so fluid it'd make any of my riding team – even my sister - green with envy, the water horse changed direction, striking its front hooves at Oppie.  As athletic as we'd trained the shire, he couldn't move the mass of his body out of the way fast enough.  Blood dripped across his silver chest.  The kelpie charged us.

I don't know which of us changed direction first, but Joseph and I turned towards the water.

Oppie's deep scream and the thunder of his gallop stopped us.  Without looking, I could feel the pressure of his approach and shoved Prince Joe to the side – and back on the ground.  The shire jumped over us, fetlocks fluttering war feathers flying above our prone bodies.  His landing resonated deep into our guts as he grunted several times.  The kelpie screeched back.  It must've moved faster than either of us saw because now it faced off with Oppie, hind legs in the brackish water it called home.  As if drawing strength from its source, the kelpie reared again, shaking blood and salt water from itself, then leaping with unnatural grace and strength to the other side of us before Oppie, huffing and limping, could intercept it.

We were between the horses again.

The kelpie came at us in a direction that pushed us towards the water again.

"Don't touch the water," Prince Joe said.

"No, really?" I growled.  He glared at me.  Both of us searched for the opening as the stallions attacked again.  "Maybe the bank?"  I gestured with my chin to where a grassy hill crested into an embankment above the a thin line of beach where the water lapped hungrily.

Joseph nodded.  "We can cut towards the woods in two different directions there."

The path took us dangerously close to the fighting horses, but I could see Oppie's dark eyes flashing every so often.  He knew where we were.

We were his herd; he'd protect us.  

We edged toward the bank, then darted as Oppie rushed the kelpie again.  I winced seeing how much of his blue-grey chest and shoulder was red with blood.  The water sparkled, so pretty in the afternoon sun, below us.  Joseph took my hand and ran towards the trees along the embankment.  They were still close to the water, some with roots hanging like skeletal fingers or worms reaching for the sometimes fresher water that depended on the tide.

They offered cover, though, and we could stay within them towards home.  And any other path would require us to dodge fighting horses.

At the very least, we were still smaller than the kelpie, and once we were clear, Oppie could retreat.  He'd find us.

The kelpie was having none of it.  Was the fae more sentient than our draft?  Psychic?  It galloped back from the shire, then turned to cut us off. 

Oppie pounded to our rescue.

When the shire was only a meter or so from us, the kelpie changed direction.  Oppie turned.  We could feel the heat from his body radiating.  The ground crumbled beneath his back hooves.  Beneath us.

We all fell beneath the shifting earth.  Somehow neither me nor Joe were hit with flailing hoof.  For a brief moment, I felt every molecule of breath squeezed out of my body by sticky horse.  I don't know what part of Oppie it was or how I wasn't killed or crushed, but I lay frozen as water pasted sand around me.  I couldn't even gasp.

"Heather!"  Joe was beside me, his normally dark face like a ghost.  "Heather? God, Heather!"

A wave broke over us, drenching, but Joseph stayed close, kneeling in shifting sand even as he lifted an arm to protect his face.  I heard the splashes and horse screams as if they were down a tunnel or through static spewing headphones.

"Heather!"

Joe had a hand under my neck and side and the world tipped over.  I sucked in air that burned my throat like razors and salt.  Then I coughed out red blood and sickly green water.

Loch weed tangled around my wrists and knees. 

"Come on, Heather!"  I felt Joseph pulling me up.  I broke away from the weeds, snapping them as more seemed to find whatever part of me touched the water.  My now soaked and muddied braids flogged my back.  We staggered backwards towards where the collapsed hill offered dry land.  I saw even more weeds climbing and tangling around Joe's legs.  He fell.

            "Ow, shite!" he cursed, trying to pull himself up.  "Damned rocks!"  I gave him my hand and tried to yank him to his feet, but water surged and more weeds grappled at him.  Blood stained down the leg of his jeans and he grimaced in pain.

            "Priiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnzzz."  The kelpie stopped and looked right at us, mouth agape and nostrils flared.  It's fiery eyes seemed to glow even brighter.  Oppie was fighting the weeds tangling his legs.  The kelpie took a step towards us, head lowered, smiling wickedly, predator teeth bared.  "Yourr bllood.  Ssmells.  Ssoooooo Goo-"

            One thrash.  One splash.  Oppie's rear legs connected with the kelpie's jaw.  Another tearing splash and the shire was mostly free, jumping and battering the downed kelpie further into the now cloudy red and black water. 

            "Come on!  Move it!  Move!"  Joe and I commanded each other, pulling each from the now retreating weeds onto dry ground.

            We managed one breath in and one out before Oppie galloped towards us.  He stopped, hooves right beside our feet, and snorted angrily, brown eyes bugging and staring at the churning water.  I gave Joe a leg up onto the shire's ginormous back and let him heft me up.  His face strained in pain as he tried to grip the broad back with his injured leg while balancing my weight as I used his boot and Oppie's mane to pull myself up – as if I were scaling a mountainside.

            I heard the kelpie scream from the water.  I heard more splashing.

            I was barely seated when Oppie took off.  I was gripping his mane and the remainder of the lead rope while Joseph gripped my middle.  We clung for dear life, and it was only the strength of our utter terror that let us hold on as we flew into the trees and away from the monster.

Hope you enjoyed it!  :)  Comments welcome.

But, Why?

One of the symptoms that you have a case of "great writing group," is that members will ask you questions that challenge you in a way that makes you want to address the issue.

Usually, these questions are pretty simple. 

Almost always, they are open ended.

From my Traveling Java group, Val (who's pagan column you absolutely need to read!) asked me why my protagonist, Heather, is insistent on keeping the whole kelpie issue secret from the adults in the story when, per my own copy, there are reasonable hints that said grown-ups won't necessarily think she's crazy… and might actually listen to her!

A very good question.

If you've read much children's or YA fiction, it's a fairly common trope that kids just Don't Tell Their Parents… well, much of anything.  Even when Anything is something pretty horrible, or even deadly.

Now, from the beginning of my drafting process, I knew I would address that issue anyway.

But still, why doesn't Heather chat with, say, Mr. McInnis who nailed iron crosses all around the barn after the first kelpie attack?  Obviously he knows a thing or two about fae.

Well, Mr. McInnis is a scary curmudgeon who feels she's too strong-willed for a child, especially a girl, and that she's brought on this fae curse.  Heather doesn’t quite know that much about Mr. McInnis, but like most kids, she can sense he's not particularly fond of her.  And grumpy.  And angry.  All. The. Time.

Ok, but her parents seem to be pretty open minded. 

She adores her dad and is truly guilty that she worried him so much in the first place, sneaking out with her best friend.  Dad's bipolar disorder is acting up, though, and he's worried about her older sister, Lily, who's a whole continent away with her biological mom, a woman less than esteemed among Heather's family.  Heather doesn't want to make Dad's life any more surreal or difficult.

Her mum, however, has written articles, fiction, and scripts that include magic and faerie.  When Heather's younger brother, Rowan, was scared that goblins would kidnap him (per Lily's teasing), Mum even did a spell from one of her books - and Heather swears it was more than just show.  At least talking to Mum might be a good plan, right?

But she doesn't.  And even though I'm writing in first person POV for Heather, she doesn't even bring up the idea of telling her parents the truth as an option. 

Now, I know why she's secretive, but it's not particularly easy to show.  It's doable, and something I have to go back and enhance - obviously because both Val and Marlys agreed with the need for clearer motivation - but a good part of it is who Heather is, and who influences the person she wants to be.

The primary influence on Heather's character is, despite being a Daddy's Girl, her mum, who she perceives as someone she wants to be like.  (Heather's not a teenager yet, so her parents have not quite descended to the levels of über-uncoolness.)  Heather's mum, like most of the women I know (including the character's namesake), is also not especially good at asking for help.  In fact, she has a bit of a goddess-complex; of course she can save the world!  Heather's Dad usually is the one who has to figure out if his spouse is getting in over her head.

Yeah, that's Heather's primary role model.

And then there's Heather's best friend, Prince Joseph ("Joe" to her, and her alone) who happens to be a prince, third in line to the throne of England.  His parents met while both snuck away from their families to fight in a war and, long story short, ended up saving a lot of lives.  He's got pretty big role models to follow, too.  On top of that, he's, well, a prince who's smothered with attention, so he's constantly trying to accomplish stuff on his own, without a whole flipping retinue that wants to help and protect him.

Heather, of course, thinks he's pretty cool.  She's also not much of a leader, and he is, so she tends to let him take charge… even when an idea (like trying to be heroes by finding kidnapped kids before the police do) is hers.

Now, I've always known about Heather's Mum's character flaw; I've know Heather's Mum longer than I've known Heather - character creation wise.  I didn't know about Joe's influence, though, until I really started thinking deeper about Heather's motivations (thanks to Val's question).  I'm also in the middle of writing a bunch of Heather/Joe scenes, so that part of his personality is starting to show.  I'll probably have to tease it out and reveal it even more for readers, but now that I know it's there, I have something more to work with.

Because, currently, Heather's Mum is under an especially difficult and unusual kind of stress, so she's not showing her "I can save the world!" personality so much in this book. (Sorry for the vagueness; spoiler land.)

Another of Heather's personality points, which comes from her mother (and is based on my own experience), is that you don't ever want to make someone else's life more difficult by asking for help if you could, possibly, handle something yourself.  Now, drawing the line of judgment of what one can handle by oneself is not easy as an adult, let me tell you!  It's less so for a kid; I remember that well.  So, you focus on the not wanting to make someone else's life difficult, no matter what.

I might be able to bring that out in writing more, adding more of Heather's thoughts.  The not-so-easy part is detecting how obvious or subtle those things are.  Unless you were raised in a family that valued family secrecy (which I was) and extreme independence (albeit very open, supportive parents), it's hard to break that down; it's ingrained.  But it must be done.

So, this seemingly simple question about Heather's motivations for this little secrecy detail is pretty important; it's not just a children's book trope I'm using.

And because it's so important, it's important that I bring it out more.

If you haven't got a fabulous writer's group that will ask "But, why?" for you, make sure you do for yourself.  I love Debra Dixon's book, Goal, Motivation, & Conflict; it's a great tool for doing just that.  She maps character goals in plots and subplots for major novels and movies to show authors how they can apply it to their own work.  The exercise is important at many levels, because every choice a character makes is a conflict affected by the goal and motivation. 

So, go question your character's motives!  (Trust me, you can't trust those characters on their own!  Any of them!)

What's going on THIS Manic Month

I managed to send updates to the Broad Universe web maven.  Just… not my own.

So, hopefully, most of you will catch this. :)

Conventions & Appearances

End of the Month: I'm at Conbust! 

I just got my schedule, and there will be a Writing & Tarot course on Friday, along with a Broad Universe RFR and a faerie panel and a children's fairy tales panel and… more stuff that's in my 169-email inbox.  I'll post the full schedule soon!

In the mean time, save the dates for Conbust:  March 25-27.

Also, because I'm working on it, I'll be running a party, a Rapid Fire Reading, and an info + sorta-kinda book sale table at Wiscon over Memorial Day Weekend.  And, likely, paneling my heart out. :) 

Kelpie Updates

March is also my deadline for having Kelpie done for beta readers.  The next scene is one I am just dying to write, but I've got a few more obligations to do before I can reward myself with speculative fiction noveling. 

I DID finish the scenes for each of my respective writing groups, though.  :)  I have to say, thanks to my fabulous writing groups, MAKING Kelpie beta-reader-ready will be much easier.

I <3 you guys & gals!

Work

I'm starting a new set of mini-reviews for Worcester Magazine.  This time: Pizza joints.

I really need to add the Wii workouts back into my schedule… in addition to making use of the indoor ring where I'm now boarding Calico.  And my asthma inhaler.  [adjusts geek glasses]

Also, I have another trade food article to do.  This one is on merchandising fresh herbs in supermarkets.  :)  It sounds like fun… onto phone calls tomorrow!

And More Work

I'm still working on Big Editing Project with the NDS.  :)

Short Story Calling

I found a potential market for E-Hell.  I just need to add about 1200 more words.  Adding words… last time I did that for a market, I sold my piece.  It was "Mirror of Hearts" to Fantasy Gazetteer. 

Wish me luck!

Because I'm nice, here's that Open Call.

Also, UnCONventional, the anthology I'm editing with Kate Kaynak for Spencer Hill Press is looking for submissions through June 1st.  It's March now… so keep on sending!

Help Appreciated

I still have that other story toying in my mind for another anthology.  Someone get me a TARDIS?  I'd even go for one sans David Tennant, as he'd just be a distraction from everything I gotta do!

That said, if you're a member of Broad Universe and reading this.  I just posted for an assistant Readings & Events Coordinator.  In fact, the few of us who do a whole lot of work for the organization are getting a bit threadbare, so, if you check out our volunteer page, you would be our angels - and help other women get the publication and publicity they deserve!

Horsey News of Awesomeness

In case you missed my announcement (and somewhat snarky opinion of a certain Facebook game), I am Riding for the Ribbon with Calico! 

My goal is to raise $300 for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure ® Foundation by riding my horse for some 9+ miles over Felton Field in Barre, MA.

Want to help?  Here's my donation webpage!

Winning Food!

The Husband-of-Awesome won the local Chili Throwdown at our favorite Deli.  :)  I came in 2nd Place, tying with a Caribbean chili.  Voters were in a somewhat tropical mood, I guess… no surprise with the winter we've had!

Some quick corrections, my Hawaiian chili meat was all pork based, not beef.  Guess what my Foodie Friday post is going to be?  ;)  Hope you like it Hot!

More Webby Stuff

After this week, I'm thinking of leaving LiveJournal for good.  Besides the aggravating ads, I get daily spam in the archive comments.  Oh, and the formatting continues to be a *itch.

If any of you have any objections or reasons for me to stay, speak now… on LJ.  If all I've got is spam this week, I'm done.  I think there's a way to just broadcast and allow no comments… if you have advice on that, too, feel free to tell me.

I also do have a WordPress account.  The more I hear about it, the more I really want to use it.  In my "copious amounts of time," I will try to set that up to match my colors and such once more. 

If you hear screams of frustrated Internet anguish from Central, MA… yeah, that's me.

In the mean time, if you don't hear anything from me, the pile of papers on my desk has collapsed and I may be suffocating.  Send help.

Fiction and Faerie Friday

What is a Kelpie?

"The classic water horse in Celtic, and especially Scottish, tradition.  The Kelpie haunted rivers rather than lochs or the sea.  When a storm was due, the Kelpie could sometimes be heard howling and wailing. […] [H]is most usual shape was that of a young horse and in common with others of his kind his favourite trick was to lure travelers onto his back and then rush with them into a deep pool, where he struck the water with his tail, causing a sound like thunder, and then vanished in a flash of light.  He was also suspected of sometimes tearing people to pieces and devouring them."

 -John & Caitlin Matthews, The Element Encyclopedia of Magical Creatures.

"The best-known of the Scottish WATER-HORSES.  […] haunted rivers rather than lochs or the sea.  He could assume human form […]  His most usual shape was that of a young horse.  He played the ordinary BOGY OR BOGEY-BEAST trick of alluring travellers onto his back and rushing with them into a deep pool [ibid…].  He was suspected of sometimes tearing people to pieces and devouring them."

- Katharine Briggs, An Encyclopedia of Fairies.

"Scotland also has its water-spirit, called Kelpie, who in some respects corresponds with the Neck of the northern nations.  'Every lake,' says Graham [footnotes omitted], 'has its Kelpie, or Water-horse, often seen by the shepherd, as he sat in a summer's evening upon the brow of a rock, dashing along the surface of the deep, or browsing on the pasture-ground upon its verge.  Often did this malignant genius of the waters allure women and children to his subaquaeus haunts, there to be immediately devoured.  Often did he also swell the torrent or lake beyond its usual limits, to overwhelm the hapless traveller in the flood."

"… and the mischievous water-Kelpie also appears in his equine form, and seeks to decoy unwary persons to mount him, that he may plunge with his rider into the neighbouring loch or river."

- (both quotes) Thomas Keightley, The World Guide to Gnomes, Fairies, Elves, and Other Little People.

Most people, when I tell them about my Work in Progress (WIP) ask what a kelpie is.  Here are some good answers I've drawn from.  There is also an entry in Wikipedia with info that I've used to help develop my Big Bad.  Elizabeth Bear also had a great kelpie character in her Whiskey and Water novel.

There was a cute movie called The Water Horse, which I know exists but I'm ignoring because my kelpie is not kid friendly. 

He's pretty damned terrifying.

And really, he should be.

First of all, horses are Big Freaking Animals.  I adore them, but I've been physically hurt by them more than by any other animal - including humans.  And most of that was just them screwing around and not meaning to hurt me.

I've been in front of a rear twice in my life - an intentional show of force.

I all but needed to change my pants.  It's scary!

Now, regular horses are prey-animals, prefer (usually) flight to fight, and eat grains.

Make one of those half-ton-and-up beasts a predator with a taste for little children?  And sentient?

F#*king horrific.

If you haven't seen the video of my horse, Calico, playing with her paddock mates, check this out… then imagine if they weren't playing. 

Oh, and they were dripping wet with weeds in their hair and fiery red eyes and wolf-like teeth?

And an aside regarding my last post on the magic of writing?  There's a prehistoric hoofed predator that's like a cross between a horse and a wolf. Oh, and the skull was found in a dried up riverbed.  So there!  Kelpie have prehistoric proof!

I'm so pleased with my Kelpie antagonist, who refuses to tell me his name so far because he's just like that, and I'm coming upon the Final Battle.  So, all I want to do is get there and write it.

So, this is all you get for my blog post.  Go look up Kelpies - and try not to have nightmares!

Magic Engaged

Especially among fantasy and science fiction writers, there's this phenomenon where we're tuned into… something… that's at least a little magic.

I'm not even talking about that "zone" we get in during writing, or how we can manipulate words to make pretty or powerful sentences.  Or even Terry Brooks' great little book Sometimes the Magic Works.

The magic I'm talking about is the stuff that makes us sit up in our chairs and look over our shoulder to catch a glimpse of that spectral being that must have been whispering in our ear when we put down something for the hell of it, when we make a guess about how something ought to work, when an idea in our heads just got real, y'all!

I've had more than a few of these instances with the current MacArthur kelpie novel I'm writing, but they're not the first for me.

Chris and I both plot similarly (at least, we do when we write together).  We go with our guts for as long as we can until we want to or need to include some details, then we research.  More often than not, especially thanks to things like Google Maps, we have found that the scene we pictured, the props we need for our characters, exist in real life. 

And we have a Keanu moment of "Whoa!"

Neither Chris nor I have ever been to the UK, but a lot of our stories happen there.  We set some scenes in Cardiff, Wales and found out that the timing we need for travel, the areas for buildings, all are right where we need them - and not necessarily based on the set pieces for Doctor Who or Torchwood, either.  Long before that, when we were writing scenes for our Shadow Guard game and stories, we found equally perfect locations in California (where neither of us had visited) and Maine (where I've been, but not where we set the story.)

For the MacArthur kelpie story, the closest I've been to Scotland are the Glasgow Lands in Northampton, MA (where we went to go see the most excellent Scottish-Canadian band Enter the Haggis).  One of my friends has Scottish lineage and his mother has a double citizenship, but I haven't done much brain picking. 

A few months ago, my writing group called attention to the fact it was time that my castle needed a firmer foundation than the mists of my mind, so I went to my friends' studio (where some truly magical research has happened on a few occasions), and spent 12+ hours of researching Scottish castles and geography.

Lo and behold, not only were a lot of the ideas in my head that I worried were a little crazy actually true, but I found actual floor-plans that I could modify with not a whole lot of work.  On top of that, and what really blew my mind, is that the location I needed to set my castle actually existed and, on top of that, housed remains of another castle as part of a nature reserve (did I mention that some major plot elements required that the story's castle abut a nature reserve?)

Scary enough, but then I started working on characters' birthdays.  Throwing aside the whole supposedly new crap about the astrological calendar, I've found that using the existing zodiac calendar has never led me wrong with character traits and that when I pull birthdays from my head for characters, they are usually spot on to their zodiac signs.  Now, the family story for the MacArthurs is complex enough without me adding in all my paranormal and faerie stuff, so figuring out when the heck every one of the kids and parents had to be born (and when they met, started dating/had sex/married) was another 12-hour day at my friends' studio.  But, like a perfect puzzle, the dates fit in and the characters were born in the zodiac signs that best fit their personalities.

Then, as if I needed some icing on my cupcakes that I now had and was eating, too (metaphorically), I decided to look up the history of the actual clan MacArthur (Clan Arthur) in hopes I wouldn't be offending actual people who were proud of their heritage by throwing in missing family lines and faerie contracts.  Well, come to find out, while one of the oldest clans in Scotland (and one that suffered a lot historically, particularly with relations in Britain… which I knew, in my head, the fictional family line had also done), there was a long time where they could not find the clan chief and the family tree was a little hard to follow. 

So, Michael's storyline could very well work in real life, too.

I'm not the only one that this happens to, either!  In a Clarion blog earlier this month, the author made a fantastic plant entry in the style of Darwin, and while the author, Eric Schaller, did a ton of research, he still notes a "happy coincidence" about Alfred Wallace having also gone to Madagascar as Darwin did, as well as the serendipity of pirates having also gone to Madagascar (both points in his fictional plant entry.)

Speaking more rationally, most writers are avid readers and researchers.  Of course, it's possible we could come across various bits of information earlier that our minds file away for later use and, beyond our conscious perception, become seeds and fertilizer laid down even before a story takes root.  I've been to more than a few Celtic faires, Glasgow Games, and similar events on US soil.  About 10 years ago, I was looking through old maps of Britain, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales for an entirely different novel.  I love British media.  I did some minor league stalking of David Tennant (Scottish) while he held the crown of Doctor Number 10.  Yes, I might have come across this information before, or at least had enough background knowledge to create plausible circumstances.

But I write fantasy.  Contemporary fantasy in particular.  I look for magic in the mundane.

Of course I'm going to find it.

The MacArthur Name Bible

A few of us New England Broads and our friends who write speculative fiction recently created a local writer's group that covers us non-Boston writers.  We call ourselves Traveling Java, and I'm loving the chemistry we have.

Most of us are submitting ongoing stories for critique, with some breaks for short fiction.  My homework for this next meeting (besides continuing my writing and changes) was to put together two things:  A cheat-sheet of the massive character list and a map of the castle the protagonist lives in.

Last night I took care of the first assignment.  (Friday, while at the artistic haven of my friends in CT, I'll take care of the map part.)

In any case, just writing a very brief paragraph for each character (single spaced) took me about 6 hours of work and left me with an 8-page document.

Wheeeeww!

I'm extremely pleased with my efforts, though.

The 6 hours and 8 pages were well spent for a number of reasons:

I hammered out clearer motivations for side-characters and side-motivations for main characters.  For example, I didn't realize how much Rowan disliked his next older sister, Lily, until that appeared in his mini-bio.  It's not even that Lily is a drama-queen-to-the-max that Rowan doesn't get; it's the fact that Heather, the sibling he's closest with, spends more time with Lily than him.

I got all the character names straight.  You have no idea how many little symbols I'd spread throughout the MSIP (manuscript in progress) for the characters I knew, but had forgotten the names of.  Or who I'd misnamed or given the wrong nickname to.  Yes, these are all people in my head, but don't you even get your family and friends mixed up sometimes?

I realized deeper meanings to some of the "throwaway" lines in dialogue that will have repercussions later.  I'm about 2/3 through the ms now, and Heather - or Monkey, the talking cat - will throw out some line that I know needs to be there, but I don't know why.  I don't do any major deletes on the drafting just for this reason… I get so much now!

I straightened out those pesky details.  The twins realllly don't have eyes that change color, I just can never remember what it's supposed to be.  Now, I can check.

I realized animals are almost as much a pain in novels as in role-playing games.  They all have names and personalities and they need to get fed and they need special food.  From a writing perspective, they need to keep popping up, like what dog wouldn't go investigate kids sneaking through the house after everyone's in bed?  And you need to give that popping up a purpose.  I mean, I could cut a bunch of them, but Heather told me they all are there, and sometimes it's just not worth arguing with your main character!

xx

Those are only a few of the things I learned in the exercise.  Besides just doing the exercise, I think the timing is key.  At a little over halfway through the rough draft, I know how most of the plot will work itself out.  (Here's hoping that keeping all her animals prevents my dear protagonist from throwing in an unexpected monkey wrench somewhere).  Anyway, that also means that I know all the characters that will be on screen or mentioned (again, fingers crossed for no surprises).  But, as I discover more of my characters' inner workings, I have time to adjust the conclusion and make it stronger.

If I recall correctly, this is also about the time I sat down and worked out much of my "bible" for Kyra Starbard's world, 2/3 of the way through draft 1.  It gave me renewed focus and I ploughed through to the end.

Which, if I also recall correctly, was actually the end of the sequel that I thought was all part of the same book.  So, ahem, when Kyra's picked up by an agent and then a publishing house, the sequel is already drafted.  Yay less work later!

In any case, if you haven't done it already, have some fun making at least your character bible.  You'll be surprised how much it helps you create a better draft and drive you to the finish!