is a captivating new epic fantasy book series for adults. Not recommended for the most sensitive readers because of the explicit content, though! But if you don’t mind severed heads and intimate scenes, keep reading.
I should be banned from using graphics software from now on. Once again, I spent the whole week creating a new cover for Runecursed though I should rather have been working with the second book… Not that I had a deadline for it. I don’t, obviously, as a self-publisher. Still, I want to write. I just can’t concentrate on it when half of my mind is constantly figuring out ways to market the first book.
I miss the time before publishing when nothing distracted me from writing. And then again, this time after publishing has been refreshing in a way. I’ve always been a loner and during the past couple of years (due to the reason we all know all too well), I’ve seen only a handful of people in real life. As a private person, I don’t use social media almost at all, so, I’ve communicated mostly with my characters (No wonder they’ve become so real and alive to me…). Now that I’ve returned to Facebook and other such as a writer, I have, to my surprise, enjoyed interacting with people.
It has done me good to step out of my own, little fantasy bubble for a while, to socialize, and do other things that I disregarded during the (obsessive) writing period, but now, I long for getting back to my daily writing routine! I hope that now that I’ve finally managed to make a cover that I actually like and enrolled the book on KDP Select (sparing myself from constantly pondering where and how should I market it), I can find my happy place anew and finish the second book.
The spring was almost here. The snow was melting and it was nice to go outside for a walk when you could actually get somewhere. That is to say, outside the common, maintained roads, in other words, forest. I rejoiced too early, of course. Today, in the afternoon, it started snowing again. Thanks, Mother Nature. More snow was just the thing we all asked for… As if there hasn’t been enough of it already this year.
So much for complaining. The weather is what it is and there certainly are worse things to deplore of in the world these days.
I’ve spent three days without writing a word. I’ve watched about twenty hours of series on Netflix (very profitable, indeed), and entertained my family in our house which is always as wearisome as it is delightful. Tomorrow, I should get back to the script though I am again slightly at a loss for how to proceed with it.
I took my protagonist where I need him to end up, and for 20 000 or so words it worked out brilliantly. Then I stumbled into the same pit as I did on the second draft (Or was it already the third? I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve rewritten his part in the second book.), him falling for a wrong guy. It is always the same wrong guy that I somehow am unable not to bring on the scene despite of knowing full well that the two of them cannot be. Still, I can’t help myself. I’ve never found writing the dialogue quite as easy as between them. It is like they were meant for each other.
Again, what I’m saying sounds utterly insane save maybe to the other writers. After all, I’ve invented the characters. I decide their fates; whom they fall in love with, whom they find not so desirable and so on. Don’t I?
When it comes to the guys in question, I seem to be but a puppet in my own play. They’re drawn to each other like flowers to the sun (Gods, did I truly just wrote down such a hackneyed metaphor?! And I’m calling myself an author…) At first, the other fellow was meant to be just a minor supporting character. A disposable one to be sacrificed on the altar of drama. He was never supposed to meet the protagonist, but in one point, I found myself altering the plot so that bringing them together became possible. And after they met for the first time… Well, I seem to be incapable of keeping them away from each other.
I am “plot as one goes”-type of a writer. I do have the broad outline sketched, but even that’s nothing, I couldn’t change on a whim if a better idea strikes me. This is obviously both a blessing and a curse. On the other hand, without such flexibility, my story would be much (even) duller than it is, but (There’s a saying about what all that’s said before the word ‘but’ is…) it also makes finishing the script all but impossible. A better twist can always occur, see.
What I’m trying to say is that I’m stuck with the cursed script again, struggling like I’ll be struggling on my midday walk tomorrow, unable to choose whether to take the maintained road, clear, yet seen countless times before, or the path in the woods overtaken by the spirits of winter which may lead me either astray, or to the ending that even the writer herself couldn’t predict. As if it mattered which route I pick. I’m still writing to practically no-one but myself. Something that I should keep in mind for otherwise, I fear I might get stuck in the snow forever.
I’ve returned to Braenduir. For five weeks, I didn’t touch the story practically at all. I had the third draft of the second book done, and I thought it was ready for the final editing. Turned out, it wasn’t.
In some point while reading through the first book one more time, I understood, the second part wouldn’t work the way it was. It was a depressing realization. Had I written over 200 000 words for naught?
I’ve been working with The Gods’ Drum for three years, written every day, a few rare exceptions excluded, half a dozen drafts, hundreds of thousands of words. Not once have I woken up in the morning with a feeling that today, I may not want to write.
Now that Runecursed is out, I’ve had much less time to work with the second book. That’s the downside of self-publishing; you have to do everything yourself from creating your masterpiece to marketing it to the masses (Pick up the slight sarcasm? You’re not mistaken, it’s there.). Fortunately, I like doing everything myself. I’d just need about 24 extra hours to my days to have time to write while trying to make someone read what I’ve written so far.
What I’m trying to say is that I experienced a slight writer’s block for the first time in three years. It was a chock. I knew I had to rewrite the second book, so, I sat down and got up to it. Turned out, I can’t write anymore. My head was swarming with ideas, good ones, even, but when I tried to type them down, nothing came out as I had intended it. Nothing worked. I was confused. What had happened to me? Had the so much time spent on social media (marketing my book) damaged my brain?
As I couldn’t write, I returned to doing other things. The ideas kept piling up in my head, the characters kept harassing me, asking why had I abandoned them, left them on the hold like that. I told them that despite of knowing where I want to take them, I’ve lost the ability to do it, and returned to my chores.
They didn’t leave me be. One of them, the one dearest to me, was especially persistent. I knew where I wanted to take him, what I wanted to do with him, but struggled with how to move him to where I needed him to be. You can’t just teleport your characters to a mountaintop unless teleportation is a common way of traveling in your world (like someone did on the eighth season…).
Break the pattern, he urged me. Just throw me there and worry about how I got there later. You know you want to.
So, I did. And found out that I can still write. I plunged headfirst in the middle of the story and have now been writing for three days, like a maniac around the clock. Thanks to my character’s persistence. (I know this sounds insane, but I also know that other fiction writers get it. We’ve all experienced the exciting and disturbing moment when our characters become something more than just paper and ink, when they become three-dimensional, and grow a mind of their own.)
What I learned from this little setback is the simple truth that most writers know…
So, if You are struggling with the writer's block, why not try writing it away.
I’ve got so many ideas for new posts, but I’ve been too busy with making a paperback of my book to do anything else. I snitched a few moments to doodle a map of the places mentioned in the book, though. It’s very sketchy and shows only a part of the Torn Continent, but it gives you some understanding of the world in which my story takes place.
I’m a big fan of maps in fantasy books myself and somewhat ashamed of taking so long in publishing one of Braenduir. When I was starting to write Runecursed, I drew a pile of maps only to realize after the first draft of the story was finished that none of them was valid any longer. The outlines have remained much the same since the beginning, but I rewrote the book four times, and the world grew more detailed by every round, I changed some of the names half a dozen times and so on.
As I’m now intending to start rewriting the second book for the third time (I had it done by the time I published Runecursed, and for a while I actually imagined it was finished and needed only some light editing but have realized lately that the story is going to a completely wrong direction…), I didn’t dare draw let alone publish a map of the lands east from Naer Heigir yet as it’s bound to change for many times over still.
PS. I submitted the ebook on LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers, so, if you’re interested, there’s now 30 free copies available for the favorites of the Fortunes!
In my first post, I wrote about what inspires me, and as there are more than one such thing, I thought to return to the subject today. Besides the nature, I’ve always been greatly inspired by music. I can’t make any music myself, none whatsoever. I was a nightmare to my music teachers with my utter lack of the gift of playing any instrument or singing back in the days I went to school. Still, I love to listen to music, mostly rock and heavy metal, but when writing, I often got something instrumental playing on the background.
The lyrics tend to draw my attention away from the work, so, ambient and electric are my choices if I feel the need of background noise. When just listening to music, however, I like it the better the more complicated and profound the lyrics get. I’m inspired by the tone and lyrics both and listened a lot of the Nordic ambient and folk music while writing Runecursed.
It’s the type of music I think could be played in the taverns of Nortenmoor or at the Conflux Nights’ celebrations in the north. I can easily imagine myself sitting in a corner table at the Three Widows with a tankard of mead, listening to the scalds playing something comparable to these songs.
I’ve worked with my book for two years, almost night and day. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve enjoyed every moment. I love writing and am forever grateful that I got this chance of dedicating myself to it for such a long time without needing to do anything else, and hope from the bottom of my heart that I could keep doing so henceforth, too.
However, now that the book is out, I’ve taken some time to do other things. Marketing Runecursed is one of those things, obviously, but I’m glad that I’ve also found time to make art, as well. I’ve always loved drawing almost as much as I love writing. Back in the day, I dreamed about becoming an illustrator, but life doesn’t always go the way you’d wish. Be that as it may, I never gave up drawing and painting though unlike writing, making art requires a stroke of inspiration.
Aelrinder.A mixed media work by J. P Aspenn.
This week, I dug my pencils out of the drawer for the first time since very long, and made this picture of Aelrinder, a character in my book. He’s one of the gods that still dwell in the Torn Continent, the Antlered One who’s worshiped in the Green Halls at Aenerhjelm. It took me a few attempts to get him right. He kept coming out way too cheerful at first, and I was already giving up with him, until today I managed to make him look rather grumpy and sorrowful, as he should be, than kind and joyful as he seems in the first two or three sketches I made.
Though I’m already itching to resume writing the second book of The Gods’ Drum, I definitely try to take time to draw more often than I have during the past couple of years. It is, after all, immensely relaxing and even quite rewarding at times.
One of the things that inspire me on my creative work, is the northern nature. I never cease to be mesmerized by the subtle beauty that surrounds me when I go out of the door. I’ve always been a bit of a “tree hugger” and besides inspiration, the nature gives me much strength and solace.
The northern lights last night. Such a whimsical phenomena!
Though in Runecursed, the influence of this particular source of inspiration isn’t quite as strong, as the events take place mostly at the western parts of the world, it is there to be found. When writing the book, I often felt that the world I’m creating is quite barren and dismal one, environment-wise, that is, but after much second-guessing, I decided that so be it. The Torn Continent as it is represents a world I’m familiar with and feel at home.
I’m hoping to put more of the north I have in me in the oncoming books of the series as the road will take my characters away from the Kingdoms, toward the northern parts of the continent where the sky is high and veiled with the skirts of frolicking maids of Faennulath, the goddess of night, as it was in our world last night.
Braenduir Chronicles 