Notes In The Margin #12: New Chapters

Sorry that this week's NITM is a tad late.  It's been a bit of a mad week...

It's also been a week of changes.  Not for me, but a several friends and the phrase "a new chapter" has been banded about a fair bit (admittedly I've been among those banding it about!).

And that got me thinking.  As a writer, I've come to consider a change in a character's status quo as the subject for an entire story, not just a chapter.  But I don't think people would really get it if you said to them "oh, how exciting.  It's the start of a whole new book for you!".

A chapter sometimes finishes on a cliffhanger and I guess that starting a new job, moving house, or starting a new relationship is a kind of cliffhanger.  We rarely know what exactly will happen next, although we may have a rough idea of how it will pan out, or how we hope it will pan out.  It can be scary, exciting, or a bit of a let down, or just the next step.

The only way we find out what does happen is to live that next part of our lives (oh, what it is to linear creatures in space-time!).

For a fiction writer, the plot of an entire story usually follows the age-old formula of Character X is living their life in a particular way - the status quo (no, it's nothing to do with the rock band).  An inciting incident then disrupts that state and they are thrust along the a path that challenges their world view, behaviour, or current state with obstacles until they emerge at the end of the story with an altered world view, behaviour or new state of normality.

At the end of it all, Character X's life is different to the life they had at the start of the story and can't go back to that old way.  Either they've changed forever, or their world has.  I know that not all stories follow that formula, but a fair number do.

And in amongst all that, there will be different chapters that take them along that path.  So, when we say that when someone is facing a next chapter in their lives, is it that we think of those chapters as a small part of the book of their entire life?  That would make sense.

I certainly don't feel like the person I was ten, or twenty years ago and my life has been split in to very clearly defined phases and adventures and I consider them more like books within a series that's made-up of multiple stories as the hero learns and changes with each new adventure rather than just chapters.

Perhaps that's just me.  Perhaps I'm over-thinking it and I should instead just celebrate the exciting new possibilities and adventures my friends are about to face.  I wish them all the very best and, as Doc Brown says in Back To The Future Part 3, "the future hasn't been written yet".  I hope for all my friends facing new a chapter, book, adventure, or whatever you want to call it, that it's a good one!

Muse News #12: Yet More Audio Beta, Kiranan Planning and I Bought A New Keyboard!

As you can probably tell from the headline, it's been a routine week this week (If there is such a thing on Planet Gilbert), but I'll regale you with the details nonetheless!

Yet More Audio Beta

[Photo: Jack Gilbert]

Now that my voice has very-nearly-almost fully recovered from its short time as a Barry White sound-a-like, I've been recording the audio beta in earnest this week.  Once again I find myself in awe of the actors and voice artists who record them for a living.  There is a definite way to speak when you're recording an audio book and a very precise metre that one needs to keep in mind.

In my haste to get the thing finished, I've found the whole thing turning into a bit of a production line and when one is in a hurry, the temptation to let little slips go are great.  Thankfully though, because I'm recording each scene individually, it will be (relatively) easy to go back afterwards and rerecord any sections when mistakes have sneaked through.

Notes In The Margin #11: People-watching

I've been people-watching again this week.  Not the scary, unhinged kind of people-watching with binoculars.  I'm talking about the studying and observation of the people around me kind of people-watching.

You may think that, actually, any kind of people-watching is a scary and slightly unhinged thing to do.  For me, it's the basis for research on how people behave, interact and think.

A busy street - great for studying people.
[Photo: Jack Gilbert]

Muse News #11: Audio Beta Recording Resumes, OneNote Migration and Beta Reader Questionnaire

It's been a funny old week full of lots of positives despite the feeling of not actually achieving very much.

It's strange how sometimes, there can be weeks like that, where you may feel like you're running to keep-up, but afterwards, when you look back and reflect on what you've actually accomplished, you find it's actually a surprising amount.

But look!  Muse News is being posted early...or at the very least earlier than normal.  Surprised? No? Flipping-heck! I am!

Audio Beta Recording Resumes

[Photo: Jack Gilbert]

I've all but shifted the annoying summer cold that afflicted me for most of last two weeks and I no longer sound like Barry White, or Darth Vader.  My voice got really deep.  That's great news for the recording audio beta schedule, which suffered as a result, but it's a shame that I can no longer go around saying things like "Simba, I am your father..." with silky-smooth resonance like James Earl Jones.

You'll only get that joke if you've watched both The Lion King and The Empire Strikes Back. Sorry.

I have, however, had a couple of comments from friends expressing their disappointment that I didn't record at least a snippet, or two, of the audio beta while I had the deeper than normal voice.

If I succumb to the lurgy again, I'll see what I can do.  The characters voices will be all messed-up, but the general narration might sound rather cool.

Anyway, with the head-cold gone, I've resumed recording of the audio beta and I'm managing to get half a dozen scenes recorded each night.  There are still over two hundred to record, so there is still a long way to go.  But, like writing, it's a matter of getting into the routine and maintaining it.

I'm good at doing that, so I will get there eventually!

OneNote Migration

Following my decision to move my digital notes from Evernote to OneNote (or "succumb to the Dark Side" as one friend put it), I've now moved the bulk of my notes to OneNote.  Microsoft provide a handy Windows application for former Evernote users to import all their notebooks, notes and tags into OneNote.

The app looks appears to faithfully transfer all the required notes into OneNote, but having said that, I haven't actually used it, so I can't vouch that it is 100% accurate.

I wanted to review my "back catalogue" of notes as I went, so I'm migrating my notes manually.  I've discovered some corkers in among the tidal wave of words and ideas and I've also discovered quite a few half-thoughts, or duplicates, so some pruning and reorganisation has ensued.

It can be quite cathartic having a clear-out every now-and-then, digital or otherwise.

I should be fully migrated by the time the two device limit comes into effect in a week, or so.

Beta Reader Questionnaire

Most of my trusty and loyal army of beta readers are now engaged in reading the fourth draft of 360 (no pressure, beta readers...I've only told the rest of the world) and I've thrown myself into the new challenge of compiling a questionnaire for them to fill-in so I can analyse their feedback.

I've not designed a questionnaire before, so I've been doing lots of reading around on the Internet to see what other writers, editors and professional questionnaire designers do.  I hope that my efforts will be clear and helpful, but I may find myself in the ridiculous position of requiring feedback on my feedback form.  I won't go beyond that (a feedback form for the feedback-form feedback-form) because I'm sure that could break reality and irreversibly warp the fabric of the universe!

Or maybe it'll just really confuse everyone.

Perhaps that's a good place to finish for this post.  I think space and time will be warped enough if I post this on time!

Notes In The Margin #10: You Can Never Have Too Many Ideas

It never ceases to amaze me how the human mind can create, visualise and manifest complete ideas and concepts from the imagination.

Especially when that imagination is my own.  It's been a fertile ground for stories and ideas for as long as I can remember.  I wrote my first stab at a novel before I was ten.  The product of childhood games, dreams and a prolonged stay in hospital.  It was nine pages long and got published in my junior school library.

When I was fourteen I corralled my ideas into my second attempt.  It was a thriller.  I got eight chapters in before I ran out of confidence and patience with my poor typing skills despite ideas aplenty.

I had another go at sixteen, this time at writing a sci-fi epic.  That one took three years and actually got finished, despite being a thousand page monolith.  It wasn't good enough to get published though. The writing's poor, the plot's confused and it's bloated with complexity, but many of the ideas I had for it are still brilliant and full of potential.  Maybe I'll rewrite it one day...

Then I got serious.  Tried my hand at a thriller again when I started working, The Wickedest War.  I wrote it on the commute to and from London each day.  I was inspired by the city, by the people, by events going on around me.  The ideas flowed and the first draft was finished in just over a year.  I submitted it to several agents ("You submitted a first draft?  What were you thinking?", you cry).

It got rejected.  But the ideas kept coming.

Sequels, fragments of ideas, revisions to old ideas and the novels, they just wouldn't stop.  I've still got notebooks brimming with observations, research, doodles and what-if scenarios from those days.

The Wickedest War got a long overdue second draft and benefited from an injection of fresh material.  That made it better, but it still wasn't right.  The third draft consumed more ideas, new scenes, new depths to the characters and the plot.  Then the fourth draft, then the fifth draft.  It changed constantly as I swung between the fresh material and those that formed the foundations of the plot.

Then the big one struck and 360 was born.  A story that demanded I create a new world without the limitations of the real world!  I went crazy with the first draft.  Too much freedom.  The imagination was let off the leash and like an errant dog, it wouldn't come to heel.

I retreated back to The Wickedest War.  Back to the real world, back to researching my ideas, testing their mettle, validating their credibility.  I took it apart and rebuilt it from the ground up.

But still the other ideas continued to flow, like turning that never completed sequel to The Wickedest War into a standalone story with new characters.  It's all there now.  It just needs writing.  But I had to finish 360. So I focused on that.

And Kiraran's Crucible.  That's simmered in a back corner of my my mind for a good three, or four years now and it's gone from one book, to three.  Ideas breeding others ideas.  Characters, settings, scenes and plot threads.

And still they keep springing from that mysterious area of my mind called my imagination.  A thousand jigsaw pieces from a hundred puzzles seeping from my head and I can't stop them.  All I know is that if I can piece them together I can make stories out of some of them.

Some of them are daft.  Some of them are really cool.  I don't think I suffer from Writer's Block.  It's more like Writer's Constipation.  I get anxious.  I worry that the ideas aren't good enough and I get all tense and the ideas stop.  Except the don't stop.  I'm just not letting them out.

Not every idea I have for a my writing will be good.  Not every idea will find its way into a story.  I have to accept that work with it.  The ideas will come.  I mustn't stop them.

The trick is keeping my eye out for the corkers and weaving them into wonderful tales!

Muse News #10: I'm Sorry, I Haven't A Clue (and not much else is happening...)

I'm sorry that this Muse News didn't get posted yesterday.

I haven't settled fully into the routine of writing my posts in the days before they're due and scheduling them to post rather than manually posting them.

Consequently, when I spent the whole of yesterday evening out there wasn't any time, or anyone to write this post, or indeed post it had there been anyone to write it.

What kind of rash frippery could possibly have attracted me away from such an important matter, you ask?  Well, I was attending a recording of a radio show.  Before you get excited, the radio show didn't actually feature me.  Well, it did, but only in the distance and as part of a large audience.

The radio show in question was the BBC Radio 4 show, I'm Sorry, I Haven't a Clue.  For those of you who don't live in the UK, or are unfamiliar with it, it's a long-running show that is described as the "antidote to panel games".  It's clever, funny, sometimes downright silly, never to be taken too seriously and one of my favourite radio shows.  It features such legendary rounds as The Uxbridge English Dictionary, One Song to the Tune of Another and Mornington Crescent.

The show's recorded in theatres around the country before a live audience and a very good friend of mine managed to get tickets to last night's recording in Southend.  They recorded two shows (due for airing in a couple of weeks) and I actually left the theatre with a pulled stomach muscle through laughing too much.

The current series (series 65) is well under way, but if you live in the UK you'll be able to catch-up with past episodes via BBC iPlayer, or listen live on BBC Radio 4 on Monday nights at 6:30pm (BST).

If you like a healthy dose of insanity, I can't recommend it highly enough!

Other News

Not much else has happened this week, I'm afraid to say.  I've been a bit bunged-up (not sure if that's down to hayfever, or other summer-spread lurgy), so I've had to take a break from recording the audio beta of 360 until I sound less infected.  You'll be surprised how much it comes across on a microphone!  Hopefully it won't be too long before I can restart recording again.

However, I've not wasted the time and instead spent it migrating my notes from Evernote to OneNote.  There is a handy app that will transfer everything automatically, but I'm taking the opportunity to sort through my notes and revise my filing and tagging systems in the process.  I've discovered a few notes I'd forgotten I'd made, so it is proving to be a useful exercise!

Well, it's very nearly Wednesday here, so I'd best sign-off and post this before it's two days late!

Notes in the Margin #9: Never Forget (Your Loyal Customers)

I hoped I'd never write a ranty blog post, but I'm afraid I'm straying into that unfortunate territory today,

I'm upset.  Upset and disappointed.  In the overall scheme of things it's really an utterly insignificant matter and there are far worse things in the world over which I should get all worked-up about, but I'm going to share it with you because you might have experienced the same thing and feel the same as I do.

In which case we can feel upset and disappointed together.

There's a cloud hanging over me today.
[Photo: Jack Gilbert]

Evernote, the note-taking are changing their charging model. (I did say that in the overall scheme of things it wasn't that major a matter).  I've been a eager user and a evangelical fan of it for several years.  I've even mentioned that it was my note-taking app of choice in a previous NITM post.

But I received an email from them yesterday (as well as reading the news in the tech press) telling me that in 30 days Evernote will limit the number of devices on which I can install and access the app to two.  If I wish to use their apps on more than two devices after that I will have to upgrade to either their Plus Plan ($3.99 a month, or £34.99 a year), or the Premium Plan ($7.99 a month, or $69.99 a year).

This may sound like a small price to pay for what is generally regarded as possibly the best note-taking app on the market, but it's not when you consider that they're reducing the access that those on the (currently) free Basic Plan previously had.

I'm not a power user.  I don't get anywhere the 60MB monthly upload limit of the existing Basic Plan (I think my record is 8MB), but I do have Evernote on a small number of devices.  I have it on my mobile phone, two tablets (a 7" and a 10") and my laptop.  That's four devices for different kinds of use ranging from information gathering on the mobile when I'm on-the-go through review on the tablets, to organizing and referencing my notes when I'm in "office mode" when I'm back home.  I don't think that's an extortionate number of devices in the current digital climate.

Being able to access my notes across different platforms was one of the reasons I liked Evernote in the first place.  Their Cross-platform access is front-and-centre on the Basic Plan's page on Evernote's  own website. "Stay Organized across platforms" they say.  Just so long as that's only two platforms if you want to install the app (they don't mention that bit).  Users will still be able to use the web version as well as that won't count towards your two devices, but the apps are more convenient to use.

So, I'm upset and disappointed that they've decided to make something that was really easy, accessible and useful unusable (for my needs) and start charging for basic and existing features.

I understand that they're a business and they have to make money, but hamstringing existing users with device limits rather than data limits, railroading them into paying for features that have previously been free and also introducing 40% price increases on the existing plans of those who do already pay isn't the way to behave to users who helped make them the widely-known brand name and company they are now.  The numerous negative comments left by users in the tech press, on Android Play and iTunes stores, as well as Evernote's own forum is testament that they've seriously hacked-off a large number of the users they purport to value.

The Evernote logo is an elephant, because - of-course - elephants never forget.  I don't think many of their users will forget this either, or go back even if things change.  Which is a shame because it really is the best of the bunch in terms of features and usability.

The apps are great and many people will continue to use them around the world for years to come despite the limitations and price hikes.  However, I'm migrating my notes to Microsoft OneNote.  It's free and I can use it freely on all four of my devices, or more if needs be.

It's a different beast to Evernote, but it just means getting my head around a different way of recording my thoughts, ideas and other random snippets of information that I gather.  Perhaps the change of digital scenery will do my creativity good!  I may even do a post about getting the best from OneNote once I've worked out how I do that.

The moral that I shall take away from all this is that you should never hack-off your customers/readers/audience.  I'm going to remember that.

OK, rant over.  I'm sorry you had to read that, but I had to share it.  I don't feel so upset now.

There...that's better!  The cloud has lifted!
[Photo: Jack Gilbert]