Notes In The Margin #3 - The Thrill of Paper

I had intended to post a completely different NITM today, but the events of the last two hours changed my mind.

What marvelous occurrence overwhelmed me?  What startling epiphany descended?  What glorious joy overtook my soul?

The Fourth Draft in all its papery glory!
[Photo: Jack Gilbert]

I printed out the fourth draft of 360.  That may not seem like an earth-shattering event to most people, but for me it was somewhat enlightening, and I'm hoping that the writers among you will empathise.   Today saw the fruits of the last five month's labours transform from ethereal and digital scrawlings on a computer screen into words on a physical page, in order, together and whole.

It's not the first time I've printed out an entire manuscript.  This is the third time 360 had been manifested in paper form (the second draft was quickly superseded by the third and consequently was not printed) and every time holding a thick, stack of paper bearing tens of thousands of words all neatly arranged into a story that started as nothing more than scant ideas flashing through my imagination just blows my mind.

In 360's case, those same 120,000 words have existed in the same order on my laptop's hard drive (and in various back-up copies) for months now, but somehow holding them in my hand just has an affect on me that I can't explain.  I'm an unashamed convert to ebooks.  I find them so convenient and rugged in a way any number of my paperbacks never were, or could be.  Their tattered edges and creased spines bear testament to that.

And from the side... (Just so
you didn't think it was just
the title page)
[Photo:Jack Gilbert]

But every now and then I have to go back to a printed book, just because there's something reassuring and physical about it.  And yes, before you ask, I am one of those people who likes the smell of a good bookshop.  I grew-up with that smell - along with several other smells like the sooty and oily whiff of good steam train - and it's just one of those things that sends my synapses sparking.  I'm just wired like that.  However, I recognise that not everyone is.

The last time 360 went to my beta-readers was nearly three years ago, ebook readers were a novelty and the majority of them read the hard copy.  This time the majority are reading a digital copy and a few are reading the hard copy.  In another three years, the ebook reader may even be a thing of the past and some other form of book consumption may have taken over - projected into our eye line on augmented reality, or VR headsets anyone? Oh, now there's a idea...I should have put that in the novel.  It's about virtual reality!

Wherever the next step in reading consumption takes us, one things is for sure: I'm going to continue printing a manuscript of each novel I write and enjoy the sense of immense satisfaction it gives me.

I think that's the feeling a book should generate in writer and readers alike.

Muse News #1:

It's been a long time since I've posted anything in my blog, so there's a mountain of news from the Gilbert pen!

After some long, deep and very meaningful chats with myself, I concluded that starting my indie publishing career (I hope!) with a potentially six book series is possibly a tad ambitious.   Consequently, I've dusted off my long-suffering techno-thriller, 360 and begun work on the fourth draft with the intention of getting it ready for publishing before the end of the year.

That means The Wickedest War, my previous work in progress, is being rested and I hope it will benefit from the many lessons I've learnt and continue to learn from publishing 360.

The Wickedest War - rested but not forgotten!
[Photo: Jack Gilbert]

So, I have been working on a project during the last year-and-a-bit of blogging silence.  I've been working hard on the fourth draft of 360 and it's been an educational and emotional experience. I've always been poor at keeping the word counts down on my novels and 360 was no exception. The first three drafts hovered around the 142,000 word mark.  I lopped off a hundred words here and there between each draft, but I always managed to justify the survival every scene to myself.

Not so with the fourth draft.  360's been on a diet.  An extreme diet.  When I powered off my laptop last night, the word count stood at a slimmer and svelte 113,000 words.  Yep, I've been merciless.  A few thousand words will have to go back in to fill in some of the gaps but generally speaking, I don't think it will go much beyond 115,000 words.

I've also rewritten other sections to make the whole thing much tighter and pacier.  This week's goal is to finish that off and complete the fourth draft.  So, it's very nearly ready to hand it over to my ever loyal and patient beta readers for their views and comments and it'll be interesting to see what they think of the revisions.  I know a couple of them liked it just the way it was.

The other thing that's occupied me recently is the development of my online presence and conversations with other writers have convinced me that I really do need to get my backside in gear and knuckle down to keeping my blog up-to-date and my Twitter stream flowing.  If you're a tweeter then please do follow me @trebligkcaj.

As for this blog, I'm planning to post a Muse News every Monday with all the latest news on my works in progress and any other events worth sharing.

Then on Thursdays I'll be posting something I'm calling Notes In The Margin.  Those posts will cover subjects that I've been thinking about (I do lots of thinking) and will usually be writing related, but I may stray into more general stuff if the whim takes me.  The first one (this Thursday) will be about doing accents for audio books, so be sure to check that out!

And if I find anything else of interest to post between all that, I will!

Until next Monday, that's all for this week's Muse News!

Post the Eighth: Know Thine Enemy (And Thine Good Guys and Thine Places...)

So, I started work on DARK DAWN just as I said I would in Post The Seventh.  However, I haven't added a single word to the narrative in the last fortnight.  Instead, I've started compiling the basic skeleton of the novel's bible, that's the reference guide for any of you out there unfamiliar with the term beyond the...err...biblical context of the word.

A small glimpse of the bible (with a small "b").
They're only spoilers if you know what you're looking for...
(Photo: Jack Gilbert)

And to procure a phrase from the Good Book, "it was good".  Is good, I mean.  But it got me thinking about THE WICKEDEST WAR.  It's now in the hands of another three beta-readers, including a fellow writer - one far more experienced than I am - and I thought to myself, "Jack, it's been two years now since you touched the half-finished bible for TWW.  I wonder how many inconsistencies they're going to find in that tome of yours..."

It turns out the answer is quite a few.

Post The Seventh: Confidence Tricks (of the mind)

It's been a bit of a crazy and full-on time at the Day Job lately, but I still feel I should apologise for not posting anything sooner.  Although, in my defence (yes, I know I'm my own prosecution counsel as well) this is about the tenth time that I've sat down at the computer with the intention of writing Post The Seventh.  However, the previous attempts all ended with me writing three or four awkward paragraphs which were then promptly deleted due to lack of clarity, direction and coherence.

The part of my brain that's responsible for assembling and committing words to the page just haven't been working properly for the last few weeks and I felt I had what they refer to in motor-racing parlance as "a bag of neutrals".  And if I'm honest, I've also suffered a crisis of confidence of late as well.

I should have seen it coming, the stress had been building-up again and I was pushing myself to stay creative in amongst it all, partially to keep my writing skills sharp but also because I wanted to stop my brain's fly-wheel from spinning itself into destruction thinking about work matters so I kept the problem-solving portion of it distracted with the construction of the plot for my next novel, DARK DAWN.

Post the Fourth: New Kid on the Blog

I should start off by apologising for the lack of posts in the last couple of weeks.  It's been a crazy start to July, some of it good and sadly also some it not so good.  I won't bore you with the details - and I don't thinks this is the place for them anyhow - so I'll just say that hopefully things are back on track and I should be more regular from now on (no sniggering in the back row).

Right, so back to the title.  Yes, it's a corny title, I know.  But frankly, it's very true - and yes, I am referring to the "New Kid" bit not the "Post the Fourth" bit.  Reading around a number of blogs I've discovered how much of a novice I am in this field.

Post the First

Well, here we are.  My very first blog post.  I've been resisting writing a blog for a while now due to a number of reasons (unfamiliarity with the format, concerns about the time needed to maintain a regular blog and - most importantly - trying to find a decent name that still available), but finally I've taken the bull by the horns (albeit tentatively), waded through what feels like a million possible titles and put digit to keyboard.

So why am I here and why am I blogging about it?

Well, if you want a philosophical answer to that question, then I'm afraid you've come to the wrong blog.  However, if you want an informative answer then read on...

I'm currently someone who writes in their spare time, although in the past I have written professionally within a variety of contexts; Drama and puppet sketches for amateur and professional performers (as well as for myself), resource material for kids workers, three promotional puppet videos for a charity that works with street children, and four so far unpublished novels (five if you count the nine pages of A5 epic that I wrote when I was six that got typed-up, illustrated and put in the school library).

Actually it might be just four.  It all depends if you count the novel I've just finished rewriting as a totally separate entity in its own right, or just a severe edit.  The characters and underlying premise are largely the same, but the plot is utterly unrecognisable and the text ninety-nine per cent new.  If they were science fiction stories one could almost market them as "Alternate Universe" editions of one another, but sadly they're modern-day thrillers so that option's out the window.

Oh, and the first novel was written a lifetime ago on my trusty Commodore 64 when I was a teenager.  It's a thousand page behemoth that's strong on creativity and teenage angst but very light on quality.  It's in need of a total rewrite - and I mean total - so that's my next project.

Which brings me to why I'm blogging in the first place.

It seems that the world and his wife are publishing e-books these days.  I've only really caught on to this fact since I gave in and bought an e-reader myself (a Kobo Touch).  I've resisted for a number of reasons and while I'd like to think it was down to a dogged loyalty to paperbacks, in truth is was mainly down to cost and the my cynicism of digital copies that could be deleted at any time by the supplier.

But while I've procrastinated the world has moved on and e-books have become more popular and more accessible.  Two years ago I gave all but two of my beta-readers - those stoic individuals who read and comment on the ugly first drafts of my novels - my previous novel a hard copy to read.  Now only two will read the hard copy and the majority have it electronically.  And if one is embracing the digital world, then one needs to do it thoroughly.  Hence why I'll be blogging my thoughts, my progress with my writing projects and anything else that seems appropriate to share with the wider world.

I'm new to this malarky, so please bear with me as I find my feet, get in to my stride and start to run with this new digital art form I've embarked upon (and forgive me when I smash metaphors together like two star-crossed lovers...).  I'm hoping to post at least once a week, but as I say, I'm new to all this so I may be a bit sporadic at first - especially as I'm heading off on a road-trip around Scotland next week.  Some of it is writing related, so you may find some excited posts unexpectedly appearing!

OK, no more editing.  This post's done.  Time to publish!  Deep breath and push the button...