Pushing on

As I recently splurged all over this blog about, writing has been a bit of a struggle lately. I haven’t been able to plan and smooth things out as much as I like to, and the write-and-post fervour of getting Starwalker up each week has been a challenge to push through sometimes.

Part of what I love about web serial writing is the discipline of it: it would be easy to let myself slip and slip and wind up not writing at all. Also, I’m stubborn, and not going to let the fact that it’s hard stop me from doing it. If that was the case, I never would have started in the first place.

I’ve got a long history of pushing through the things that try to hold me back. I’ve had many reasons to give up in the past, all health-related. I’ve had arthritis and other joint issues my whole life, and I could have let it stop me from doing all kinds of things. Sports, trips, playing in the snow. I was a district high jump champion when I was 13. I’ve been skiing (I sucked at it, but I went!). I learned karate at uni. The issues were always there, but I dealt with them.

Nowadays, my biggest challenge is Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I could have let it stop me doing all kinds of things: things around the house; going out; working. I could have let it stop me writing. I’ve had to make many compromises to live with this condition – and I still do, every day – but I’m stubborn too. I manage it. I work around it. Sometimes, I accept my failings and flagging energy, and I have to deal with that, too.

But I refuse to let it be an excuse. If I had, I never would have succeeded with the Apocalypse Blog and written a post every day for a year. I wound up writing three novels that year while working full time and doing everything else that fills up my time. (Sometimes, I still wonder how I pulled it off!)

If I had let CFS be an excuse, I wouldn’t be writing my current web serial either. It is a struggle, every week, to get the posts out at the moment. It’s harder work than I like. But I push on.

I still love it. It still works, even when I don’t think it will. I’m mentally drained this week, and I only had a vague idea of what I wanted the post to be about the day before I was due to start writing it, so I was facing this week’s writing with a note of despair. Then, just before I went to bed, an idea popped into my head. It was one of those lightbulb moments and I knew exactly what the scene needed to be.

It fought me. The two characters talking in the scene don’t rebound off each other well and they took some convincing to play nice. It was a hard conversation, for me and for my main character, but that’s part of the point of it (it’s no fun if it’s easy, after all). And at the end of the scene, Starry turned an unexpected corner. It blossomed out into an unexpected realisation for her, one that fits perfectly with the kind of emotional journey she has been moving through lately. It was more than worth the fight.

Sometimes, things just work. The post ended on the kind of note I wanted, and the ship is swooping in towards the next post, which I can’t wait to get to. (It’s one I’ve had in mind for a while.) I love it when a vague, half-formed plan works itself out right in front of you.

So here I am, pushing forward. I aim high, knowing that I’ll at least achieve some of what I want, maybe even most of it. Aiming for the stars is a good way to fly, even if you only clear mountains.

Where I’ve been

2012 has been a rocky year for me so far. One of the most obvious signs of that is the lack of posts on this blog. I keep coming back here and lining up things I want to post about, but finding the time and brain-space to actually post has been out of my reach for much of the time.

I won’t go into detail why. I’ll just summarise and say that my day-job has been very stressful (more so than it ever had before). I don’t deal well with unreasonable expectations, untenable positions, or problems I’m unable to fix. I’m under a certain amount of pressure at home as well (most of it financial and none of it anyone’s fault – life just gets that way sometimes). Couple all of that with CFS (which is made worse by stress, of course), and, well. Let’s just say that it has been a strain to get anything productive done in my ‘spare’ time.

This blog is usually the first thing to fall off my radar when I get busy, as it’s the one I have least commitments to. So, to those of you who read this blog: my apologies, and thanks for your patience. It’s not that I love you least! I’d make more of a commitment to updating here if I thought I was capable of maintaining it!

Sadly, it has also been affecting my current web serial. I’ve missed posts, delayed things, mostly due to health reasons. I despise doing that. Part of what works for my web serial writing is keeping to a schedule, and missing that schedule means I’m letting myself (and my readership – more on that later) down. However, I have to be realistic and recognise that it’s not always possible to keep it up! And I’d rather not put up a shitty post just for the sake of posting.

All the same, I think the quality of the writing has probably suffered. At least a little. It makes me sad to know that (I take a great pride in my work, and I consider the web serial ‘work’, not play). It also makes me look forward to editing Starwalker! (Whenever that may be.)

However, it’s not all dire news. Firstly, I’d like to say that I have the most wonderful readers. They have been nothing but understanding and supportive, despite the amount of ‘sorry guys, there’s gonna be a delay on the next post’ messages I’ve had to put up so far this year. I’ve had so many wonderful comments, letting me know that it’s okay to take the time I need, and even emails offering more support and advice.

I can’t tell you how much I appreciate those messages. You guys are why I write. You make it all worth it!

I work to live and live to write. I push myself to write more and write better because I love it. I have so many ideas, so many things I want to do, so many stories I want to share with the world. Running around in my head right now:

• Starwalker (in progress!).
• Apocalypse Blog shorts (shelved but not forgotten).
• Vampire Electric, the steampunk novel (along with a couple of non-vampire sequels).
• Screw Loose, the robot brothel (the next web serial? Maybe!).
• Starwalker spin-offs (I have a few in mind, including the villain shorts, the story of the Carapace, and something centred on the consciousness of stars).

I can’t wait to get to them all. I can’t wait to share them with everyone. I can only focus on one thing at a time right now (between working full-time and fatigue), but I hope to get to them all eventually.

And then there’s all the other writing stuff I’m involved in. I’m still running my Creative Writing Group every month, and the Monthly Write-ins are where I get a pile of writing done! Planning for NaNoWriMo 2012 started a couple of months ago and is already galloping ahead.

On top of all that, the ebook sales for the Apocalypse Blog are going amazingly well. (I’m hoping to do a post specifically about that; fingers crossed I’ll get to it soon!) I got my first cheque for ebook sales in this week! I can now say that I’m a professional, (self-)published author.

So, yeah, it’s been a hell of a year so far. But I’m just finishing a week’s holiday from work and I’m feeling better. I’ve caught up on a few things (this blog being one of them!). The work of dealing with the stressful parts of my life continues, and they’re being weeded out steadily.

Writing posts like this is usually an interesting exercise for me. I know I’m ambitious with everything I try to do. I know I push myself hard (mostly because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t get anything done; it’s too easy to let CFS be the excuse that stops you from doing or being what you want).

Today, I look at everything here and I think: I’m actually pretty awesome. I’m holding it together and I’m getting there. I’ll come out of the other side of this rocky patch better than before.

Most of all, I’m grateful. For the friends who listen to me whine, who hug me and make me laugh. For the family who love and protect me. For the budding MLs who are helping me with the NaNo stuff this year, and my previous co-MLs. For the readers who enjoy my work, both those who let me know and those who visit silently. For those who spend their money on my work, both through donations and buying ebooks, and help me know that they believe my stories are worth paying for.

You all know who you are. I love you and thank you. I’m lucky to have you in my life.

Time to press onwards. Hopefully you’ll hear from me soon! Be well, everyone, and I’ll try to do the same.

Reflections on Starwalker Book 2

As noted on the hiatus notice on Starwalker, the end of Book 2 marks several milestones for the story. Two years; two books; just over 200,000 words!

It’s bewildering when I think of it in those terms. I can’t believe it has been two years already! Averaging a book a year is pretty good, though, especially with everything else I have going on lately (I’m working on another novel in tandem with writing Starwalker, and I have a couple of other projects in the works too), not to mention my ever-questionable health.

(Warning: spoilers ahead!)

When I started Starwalker, I didn’t have any ‘books’ planned. I had a set of rough chapters laid out, which turned into phases that the story is moving through. It wasn’t until I approached the first 100,000-word mark that the shape of the books started to make itself known. Since then, I’ve been able to plot the story in slightly more purposed arcs, while still keeping true to my original plans. (The storyline isn’t set in stone, but there are a few definite things I want to do with it!)

The first book wound up being about the identity of the Starwalker: the ‘who’ behind the ship’s tweaked AI. She had a lot of discovery to do, and a lot of decisions to make about the kind of ‘person’ she wants to be (inasmuch as that term applies to her!).

The second book delves more into the notion of ownership (and, by extension, loyalty). As a ship that has been designed, commissioned, built, supplied, and paid for by  a company, just what is her position in the world? How much autonomy does and can she have?

Several things come up that make Starry question her priorities, and loyalty to the company might turn out to be more trouble than it’s worth. But what right does she have to break free of them?

It’s a fun subject. I didn’t go into the legal side of it too heavily, because the Starwalker is largely acting outside the law at the best of times, but when it does come up, I’m sure the term ‘slave’ will be bandied about. I do love some complications!

This is a tricky subject and there was a lot of ground to cover. I was almost to the end when I realised that I wasn’t going to get everything that I wanted to into the story arc:  it was heading for an ending-point and there wasn’t any way to squeeze in one particular element that I wanted to do. (This plot-point will go in Book 3 now.) This is one of the pitfalls of writing on the fly like I do!

I’m usually pretty good at steering things where I want them to go. I had to get the ship back to Earth’s solar system to make the end of the book work, and that was a challenge in itself! I did a lot of shuffling of pieces in my head to make that happen, but it meant that they couldn’t get to that one last place to finish off the Ownership story completely (Dyne, for those keeping track).

It’s one of those things that I’ll fix up in editing, I think! On the whole, I’m pleased with how it all came out, and where the story is going.

I also love the reactions I’ve had on the twist at the end: they were exactly what I was going for! The Starwalker universe is expanding and my poor little ship is going to have to sprint to keep up. This is something that I’ve had in mind for most of the time I’ve been writing it and it was so much fun to finally get to write it in there.

It’s funny to think that I’ve been waiting two years to write some of this stuff! And there’s so much more to go yet. I’m two-thirds of the way through my original plot plan, and about to launch into Book 3. I’m not sure what to call it yet: the preliminary name is Repercussions, though I was also tossing up Responsibility for a while.

(Okay, spoilers done.)

Well, I’ve had almost a month off Starwalker, and it has been good to catch my breath. Soon, I’ll be starting the first bit of Book 3. Wish me luck!

In the meantime, here’s a bit of concept art of the Starwalker. I’m having some artwork done and this a sneak peek of a coloured sketch. You should have heard me squee when I received this! Hopefully, more coming soon:

Concept art for Starwalker

Still alive!

I can’t believe that it has been so long since I updated this blog. I’m so sorry! It has been months, and whenever I think of it in those terms, my brain says, “Months? Nah, it can’t be… oh, it is. Damn.”

Every time I have thought about writing something for this blog lately, I’ve had the desire and intention to write a post but the time has just slipped away from me. Even now, I’m writing this on the train on the way home, taking a break from writing actual fiction.

So, what have I been up to? It has been a packed, crazy few months. Let’s see if I can summarise my recent journeys in fiction and writing, and catch up to now.

November was NaNoWriMo, as it always is for me. Not just because of the challenge itself, but also because I’m a Municipal Liaison for this region. That means: prowling the forum with encouragement and aid for my faithful, madly-typing wrimos; organising and running events all over the city; putting together prizes and competitions; working full time at my day job; and, oh, writing a novel.

NaNo 2011 was a weird one. Usually, our numbers swell progressively from year to year, as word of the madness spreads and more lemmings leap off the novelling cliff into the wordcrafting updrafts. 2011, though, saw our event attendance drop, which worried my co-ML and me at first. We did everything we could think of to spread the word and it did pick up through the month (usually, it drops off!). Overall, we were really happy with how it went. We met a pile of new friends and had a blast, and we’ve got stacks of ideas to make NaNo 2012 bigger and better yet.

I managed to slide over the 50,000-word line without much problem, too! Despite everything that was going on, the writing came easily and quickly for me. I can’t say how much of a relief that was!

I used half of the NaNo wordcount target to finish off the second book of Starwalker, which has just finished posting (phew!). It was great to get ahead of the curve for a change!

Once that was drafted, I moved on to a project that has been tickling in the back of my brain for a while now. It’s a novel (rather than a serial), it’s steampunk, there are kinda-sorta vampires (I struggle to take ‘straight’ vampires seriously), and the central protagonist is a librarian. It’s possibly the first in a trilogy, as it links in with another story that I’ve been toying with for ages, though I’m still working out how they play together in the sandpit. I’m having lots of fun with it, though.

The end of NaNo was a relief: I was glad to put it to bed, but sad too. It’s a wild ride and I’m always more than ready for a rest when it’s done! A lot of December was spent recovering, as well as catching up on my day job, madly preparing for the more mundane events (like Christmas), and attempting to keep up a little momentum on my writing.

The two projects I worked on through NaNo have kept me busy since November ended. When I haven’t been editing and polishing Starwalker for posting, I’ve been writing the steampunk. The latter is up to 70,000 words and still going strong; there’s quite a long way to go there yet. I’m hoping I’m over the halfway point, but I don’t like to restrict myself; we’ll see where it goes.

Now that Book 2 of Starwalker has finished (more on that in another post soon!), I’ve decided to take a bit of a break before delving into Book 3. There is a third project that I’ve been struggling to get to, so I’ve decided to dedicate February to making a dent in it: editing the Apocalypse Blog for ebook release.

I’m up to the second book (of the main trilogy; that is, not counting the prequel). It’s over 100,000 words now and it’ll be even bigger by the time I’m finished. I’m hoping to get through all of Book 2 in the next month, so both of my other projects are on hiatus until 29th February.

It’s a bit of a gamble. The most dangerous thing for my writing is for me to take a break, because I find it so difficult to pick up a project mid-way through after I’ve put it down. That’s one reason why web serials work so well for me: they have additional pressure for me to keep the momentum up; and having people reading and waiting for the end pushes me to get there. So, Starwalker readers, don’t fear: I’ll pick that story up again. Getting back into the steampunk will be harder, though.

It will be worth it. I really want to get more of the Apocalypse Blog out (I’ve been getting emails asking me when more of it is going to be released in ebooks!). I want to get all three books edited and polished, and maybe look at doing a set of short stories related to it (I have plans for that somewhere). The short stories will depend on my other commitments once the ebooks are out of the way, though.

I’m certainly not short on plans. There’s so much I want to do! Starwalker and related spin-offs (I’m not going to say now just how many kernels of ideas there are already growing in the Starwalker universe). AB ebooks and spin-offs. The steampunk series.

Well, fingers crossed, I’ll get to it all before too long. Life, health, and work permitting!

I’m still battling with my health on a daily basis. Stress at the day job coupled with a general decline of my energy levels makes summoning up the creative juices so much harder these days (that’s why I am finally writing this blog post, because I’m not quite feeling up to thinking about story this afternoon).

We’ve got a big deadline at work coming up in April, and I think things are going to be rocky for me until that passes. Such is the fun of being a team leader. I’m hoping that things will improve after then, but I’m becoming more and more sure that I’d really like more of my mental energy focussed on my creative writing. It’s where my heart lives, and I have so little energy to go around these days. Those who know me know that I have a habit of picking up responsibilities, though, and I don’t know how easy letting go will be. I guess we’ll see about that.

In the meantime, I hope to not let it hold me back. I’ve had CFS for years now and I’m not putting my life on hold in the hopes it’ll get better soon. Push through and carry on, as always.

I have an ambitious year ahead of me: AB ebook releases; Book 3 of Starwalker; submitting the steampunk for publication; more NaNo organisation. It’s entirely possible that I’ll be arranging a writer’s retreat weekend for this November, too. It’ll be hard work but so worth it!

I’m still here; I’m still writing. It’s hard going right now but I’ll get there. Here’s to aiming high!

When they get away

Warning: potential spoilers here. If you haven’t read (up to and including) this week’s Starwalker post, go catch up quick!

So, this week’s Starwalker post went a little sideways on me while I was writing it. Which is not to say that it went badly – on the contrary, the reactions have been very positive! It just wound up not being what I intended.

I’ve got a little list of the stuff that I need to cover in order to get the story to where it needs to be for the end of Book 2. Next in line was a discussion about the implications of time travel, but somehow, the characters didn’t want to talk about that. No, they decided that they’d get hung up on the issue of legally changing the starship’s ownership to escape prosecution.

As I was writing the scene, it reminded me of at the end of Book 1, in which the crew had to decide whether to stay on board or not. This week’s post came down to the same question, for a different reason. I’m not a fan of repetition but it was difficult to get away from – the decision had to be made in order for them to be able to move forward, and while the captain could have made it on their behalf, that’s not the sort of person he is. Not to mention that having a pissed-off crew would have caused more and different problems down the track.

Perhaps it’s a happy symmetry, instead. Both books have come to a point where the crew have to weigh up just how much they want to stay, points of no return for them to step over. Thinking about the projected arc of the third book, it’s likely that there’ll be a moment like that towards the end there as well (again, for a different reason).

 I suspect that when it comes to editing the Starwalker books (into ebooks or for submission to traditional publishers), I’ll either shine them up into a more pleasing symmetry, or take one of them out. Having just got done with editing the first book of the Apocalypse Blog, the chances of me taking something out are fairly slim (I hate throwing stuff away).

There’s definite scope for improvement in there, though, once I can see the bigger picture. Writing the way that I do, it’s sometimes hard to keep the big picture in mind, especially as deep into the story as I am right now. I’m pretty determined that I won’t start editing this story until I have all three books written, so I can get that 1,000-foot view of the story as a whole.

Back to this week’s post, it wound up completely missing out on what I originally set out to achieve. I had written in the talk about time travel at the end, but that not only added almost 1,000 words to the post (and they’re getting way too long lately!); it also changed the tone of the post entirely. Starry’s giddy moment was quashed by the seriousness of what followed and wound up getting lost.

The more I looked at the post, the more it felt crammed and trying to do too much. It wound up muddled, particularly in terms of the emotions running through it. And, hell, I’m not tied to any particular deadline for the end of Book 2, so why rush it? So the serious bit at the end has been pulled out (and will be filled out/polished for next week’s post) and it just focusses on the crew’s deliberations and decisions.

I tend to write for and from character, and I’ve grown to love writing the conversations in Starwalker. The transcript-style format is fun to play with, and I enjoy the rapid back-and-forth nature of it. My cast have such different voices to play with, and often their perspectives surprise me.

I had expected Cameron to be the one to be most disturbed by the captain’s proposed course of action (due to the legal violations involved), but she was very calm and pragmatic about it. Elliott was quiet, which makes a change from his usual mouthiness, but he already knew about the proposal. Rosie got to be the outraged one for the most part, which amuses me because she’s also the one most likely to smack someone in the face.

Of all of them, Lang Lang was the biggest surprise. When I started the conversation, I wasn’t sure how she would react, but when it came time for her to speak, she knew exactly what she wanted to say.  That was one of the easiest bits of the post for me to write (and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me a little emotional!).

I think it was Lang Lang’s statement that determined the subject of the post. Her quiet declaration and its affect on Starry fitted so beautifully into the starship’s evolution that I wanted to hug them both. Starry’s going through so many changes lately, stamping around in her processors like a rebellious teenager, and she needed this little gem to alter her perspective slightly.

Through much of this book, Starry has been a kid trying to work out who she wants to grow up to be. She has been searching for so many things, like safety, security, and belonging. Her homecoming and Is-Tech’s rejection damaged her more than she realises – they’re her parental substitutes – but it also gave her the strength to try to stand on her own. Lang Lang’s statement helped with that too, but in a more positive way.

I bandied names for the books around a while ago, and have roughly settled on Identity for Book 1, and Ownership for Book 2. The story is taking that idea into places I hadn’t originally planned, just like this week’s post didn’t quite turn out the way I had intended. But I’m far from complaining: I love where this is going. It’s so much fun to write!

Can’t wait to share it all with you. 🙂

Weekend of writing and awesomeness

It’s been a hell of a weekend, and though it’s Tuesday, it has only just finished for me. Why, you ask? Well, let me explain…

On Friday, my Creative Writing Group met. I decided to do a session on first lines, and took along a list of first lines from novels across a range of genres and periods (many thanks to my friend who helped me to compile the list). Then we discussed them blindly (that is, without knowing what book or author they were from), to see what we thought of them as first lines on their own merits alone.

It was an interesting exercise and prompted a lot of talk. Curiously enough, even though someone didn’t like the first line, they would usually read on to find out the answer to the (annoying) question that was posed. It turns out that grabbing your reader doesn’t have to mean grabbing them in a good way. Boring first lines came out the worst of all, and I think that’s a good rule of thumb: never bore your reader.

After the meeting, there was dinner and bookish chats with my writing-friends. Always good to do that!

Saturday was the day of my RedFest talk, which I have squeeped and babbled about recently. It was my first appearance at an event like that; I’ve done plenty of talks and so on for my CWG, but this was different! And, for the record, I hate public speaking. I’m getting better at it (slowly), but I still got horribly nervous.

Big thanks to my friends for supporting me at the RedFest (you know who you are): helping me set up and giving me tea and sitting through the talk to bulk out the numbers. I didn’t get many attendees (probably about ten in total), but that was fine by me. I hadn’t expected a lot of people to come to the talk; it’s a local fair, and I guessed that most of the people who were seriously interested in writing would be at the Brisbane Writer’s Festival. Why do all of these things have to coincide?

I had some good questions from the audience and managed to cover all the material I had written out for publishing online. Overall, I was happy with how it went, and learned some things to use for next time (should there be one!).

After we had escaped the clutches of the RedFest, I got all dolled up with some friends and headed out for dinner to celebrate my birthday. Had a great time: too much food, cocktails, and ice cream; and much talking and silliness.

Sunday was an early start – we had to be on a train by 8:15 – which was awesome after the night before. Luckily, I was without a hangover (I hadn’t drunk anywhere near enough for one of those, despite pouring Baileys on my ice cream). I was heading to the Brisbane Writer’s Festival, determined to get in at least some of the events before the whole thing was over.

I managed to get to three talks in total, none of which were exactly what I was expecting. They were on the digital revolution in writing, writing about taboo or ‘dangerous’ ideas, and literary vs popular fiction. I was left largely disgruntled with how the talks turned out (apart from the middle one). I plan to write up blog posts about each of them, so I won’t go into detail here – more soon!

In the middle of all of that, I snuck up to the Queensland Writer’s Centre and collared a couple of the lovely, helpful staff. Some more of our NaNoWriMo plans have been sorted out, and the QWC will be supporting us again this year. I’m currently working with them to arrange a write-out in November: writing out on a lawn by the riverside, in shade and sunshine.

I also took part in a writing race at the QWC, captained by the lovely Trent Jamieson. An hour of writing intensively, in a scarily quiet room! I went in with not a clue about what this week’s Starwalker post should be, managed to write almost 2,000 words (!!!), and won the race! Excellent.

I’m still not sure what this week’s Starwalker post will be, but I have a pile of material to massage into something coherent. Whether it will make the post easier or harder to construct has yet to be ascertained.

After such a packed weekend, I took a day’s holiday from work to recover (yesterday). A sleep in, a lazy day on the couch with games and DVDs, and nothing pressing to do was just what the CFS ordered. Then my folks took me out for beautiful slow-cooked steaks (another birthday dinner), and we stuffed ourselves with way too much food.

I’m back at work now and definitely feeling brighter for the break. It’s been crazy but so worth it! Some of the stuff that was talked about over the weekend is ticking at my brain, and once this weeks Starwalker is sorted out, I’ll be turning my attention to capturing those thoughts into posts and sticking them up here. Don’t hold your breath; it might take a while.

Thanks to everyone who made this weekend awesome. Best birthday I’ve had in a long time. Here’s to surviving another year, and to lots more to come!

Starwalker’s 100th post!

This week, Starwalker reached post number 100!

Wow. On the one hand, that’s a startling amount of posts to have up. On the other, it’s taken over a year and a half to get this far.

In 2009, it took my a year to write all three books of the Apocalypse Blog, using over 340,000 words. It was hard work and a hell of a ride, but the best fun. I wouldn’t trade it for anything, but I don’t think I’ll ever attempt that again, either.

In February 2010, I started Starwalker. Now, over 18 months later, I’m over 170,000 words and moving into the final section of the second book. It’s a big change of pace, but one that I definitely needed.

I’ve gone from 7 posts per week to 1, and from 3 books per year to 1. That’s not a bad ratio, I think.

Let’s have some fun stats (because spreadsheets are a great way to procrastinate when the creativity bug isn’t biting). I’ve also been pondering names for the books – they’re below, so tell me what you think!

Starwalker Book 1: Identity (complete)

• Total wordcount: 99,734
• Total posts: 64
• Average wordcount per post: 1,558

Starwalker Book 2: Ownership (in progress)

• Total wordcount: 73,447
• Total posts: 36
• Average wordcount per post: 2,040

In a continuation of my usual pattern, the posts are getting longer as I go on. I’m okay with this! It’s hard to keep the post length down sometimes, but that’s much easier to manage since I abandoned the real-time posting (I can spend three weeks writing a single event if I want, and just have the log posts run on from each other).

This is the kind of milestone that is a good time to take stock. See how far I’ve come and how much story I’ve got still to tell. I’m proud of the body of work I’ve built up already, and I’m looking forward to exploring the plot I have yet to spin into words.

I’ve lived with this story for a couple of years now and it still excites me. At this point, that’s a relief as well as a pleasure! I can’t wait to share the end of book 2, and the third book is snapping at my heels, eager to jump out. There are so many changes coming, and I’m looking forward to seeing how the characters shape up (or fall down, because I’m cruel).

And that’s just the main Starwalker run I have planned out. Don’t get me started on the spin-offs that are taking shape in the dark corners of my brain.

Starwalker isn’t easy to write. It’s challenging and sometimes a struggle to get down, but it’s worth it. Sometimes I grin at the characters; sometimes they make me want to cry. I love all of them, and I adore the readers that have joined me on this journey.

Every writer says that they have the best readers (and they mean it!), and so do I. They’re wonderful to have supporting me, and they’re a big part of why I write. Thank you!

So here’s to 100 posts in, and to the next 100 to come. I hope you’ll all join me and enjoy the ride!

Starwalker’s drones

I’ve been thinking a lot about the characters of the drones in Starwalker lately. They’ve been developing quietly (and sometimes not so quietly), and are the best fun to write. They’re a part of the story that has a habit of surprising me.

The first thing to note is that they were not part of my original plan for the story. I have a pinboard at home covered in notecards – for characters, plot points, major entities, etc – and they’re not on it. It’s been a while since I updated it, but their absence is a sign of how their role has always been a question for me.

They were added to the story as one of those things it makes sense for a futuristic starship to have, like engines and hull plating and artificial gravity. The drones to do the jobs on board that people don’t want to do, can’t or shouldn’t do because it’s dangerous for a squishy human, or are simply unable to do. They had to be of different sizes, to fulfil different roles:

• Tiny ones for crawling around ducts and pipes, getting into those hard-to-reach places (Bit and Byte)
• Big to do the heavy lifting and external work (Wide Load and Big Ass)
• Mid-sized for general maintenance and eclectic duties, from repairs to cleaning; from tidying up personal quarters to preparing and fetching food; and, more recently, emergency medical care (Waldo and Casper).

Because it would be silly to have only one of each (everyone loves a failsafe/failover), the Starwalker has two of each kind as standard. So, six drones in total. Easy, right?

Except it would be no fun if it was that simple. The drones are an extension of the ship’s AI; a part of how a ship runs and maintains itself. And because the Starwalker‘s AI is a little bit broken/special/tweaked, it makes sense that her mobile units would also be different from the norm.

Plus, I have a great fondness for characters like Johnny 5 from Short Circuit. I had no wish to recreate him (this is one of the reasons why the drones don’t speak – others below), but he’s one of the inspirations for the metal boys in my story. Another is Wall-E.

 So, I have drones and a kooky AI linked to them. An AI that has a human subconscious mind (that, to start with, she didn’t know about), wonky processing, and emotions. The drones are symptoms of her real mental situation, an externalisation of her subconscious.

They’re linked into her automatic processes but they are autonomous; they have enough programming to fulfil their duties without the AI holding their hand and making every calculation and decision for them. They’re not quite full AIs themselves, though. At their core, they are much simpler beasts.

They’re also the closest thing that the ship has to ‘hands’ and a physical body that can interact with the crew. However, I decided long ago that I didn’t want to give her a ‘robot body’. So having them not be her actual hands worked better for what I was aiming for: she doesn’t do things with her drones; she asks them to do things for her. It’s a subtle distinction, but an important one.

Over the year and a half I’ve been writing this story (wow, that long?), I’ve developed the drones and their role. Starry, the personality that’s growing out of the AI/human meld, is changing and they’re changing with her. They are still agents of her subconscious; her personality spills over into them, and they become expressions of facets of her. Waldo tries to look after Elliott, while Casper is more like her mischievous side. Byte threw himself at a bomb in a doomed attempt to protect the crew, and Bit is angrily upset over his missing brother (the parallel with Danika and her missing brother is not something I had planned, but let’s pretend I did, because it works out awesomely).

The two heavy drones are probably the least distinct so far; they always come as a pair. They’re the solid backbone of the drone lineup; the big brothers who grab your collar and lift you back onto your feet. They’ll still quietly do what drones shouldn’t really do, though, like paint the name that Starry wants on her hull but is too afraid to consciously order them to put there. They’re still developing, and I’m still shaking down their role on the ship, not to mention how they fit into Starry’s muddle of self-expression.

Lately, the boys have become more independent. Starry’s going through a trying time (and something of a crisis of confidence) and they’re showing the cracks in her mental composure. She isn’t controlling them as much as she was and their actions are becoming more extreme examples of what’s going on under her hood. When she gets herself back on a more healthy psychological footing, I’m not sure how much they’ll calm down – they’ll probably fall into line a bit, but I’m not sure if they’ll go back all the way to where they used to be. The issues she’s dealing with right now will plague her for a while, and so will the effects they’re having on her drones.

Being expressions of Starry’s subconscious mind, I thought it was better not to give them voices. If they spoke, they would be more conscious, distinct entities, and lose a measure of the abstraction they currently have. Starry speaks for them, if necessary, and is responsible for translating their moods and actions into words (like the conscious mind! Get it?). Even with her datalinks, she doesn’t always fully understand what they’re up to, partially because she doesn’t look too closely into their systems and mostly because she tends to accept whatever the drone chooses to tell her. She hasn’t had a reason to delve any deeper… yet.

So, instead, they are more inclined to use body language with the crew. The drones’ actions emote enough for them to communicate, and I find it’s fun to have them express themselves in physical ways. I toyed with some kind of data readout/text display on them, but it hasn’t been necessary, so it hasn’t appeared yet.

Overall, they’re one of those nice surprises that stories can throw at you. The challenge of giving a ship ways to express herself is leading me into all sorts of interesting places, especially given the restrictions I’ve put on myself. These characters grew naturally out of the story and I love it when that stuff happens.

I adore my little drone boys; they’re great fun to write and handy tools for me to use. They’re going to be around for a while yet!

Starwalker breaks 2,000!

I went to check my web stats today, and had a lovely surprise (which was very welcome after the last couple of days!). In June, Starwalker had over 2,000 different visitors! How awesome is that?

The daily visit rate is hovering around the 200 mark, which is also pretty good (though not as good as it used to be).

Best of all, I visited Top Web Fiction, and found that Starwalker is currently sitting at the top of the science fiction category! Wow. (And number 5 overall.) That is humbling, considering the wealth of wonderful webfiction out there. Thanks to everyone who voted! You are awesome.

A nice end to my day. 🙂

Hacked: mine now

After much worrying, struggling with code and ftp, and much support from friends, the Starwalker site is now fully back under control. Phew!

I’m currently backing everything up, upgrading my various WordPress installations, and looking into further security measures that I can put in place. I don’t need to go through this again, thanks!

I’ve had a pounding headeache all day that seems to be defying painkillers, so it looks like I might not get to this week’s Starwalker post today. It’s all written, but I need to spend some mental energy on editing it before it goes up, and I’m not sure I have any left right now! If not tonight, I’ll get it up tomorrow.

I’m still getting a few errors cropping up on the Starwalker site, but they all seem to be fairly minor. I’ll clean them up when I can.

So far, the upgrades are all going smoothly. Let’s hope the rest of this process stays that way!

Thanks to everyone who has helped me through this. I’ve had so many offers of help, advice, and support. You’re all wonderful! Thank you!