On the nose

I was just posting this morning that experience is the best tool for writing a scene. Walk in actual woods, feel the heft of a sword in your own hands.

I'm hoping to finish the Athens demonstration scene today. And at the very moment I type this, protesters are marching past my building banging drums and shouting slogans. It's animal liberation, as it happens. There's no sign of Molotovs and teargas, thankfully.

But I'm at a sticky place on this scene. In real history, nothing happened on my selected weekend. Well, nothing major. There were major demonstrations and riots that year, however. Thing is, there are patterns to these things.

I've been setting up the Prespa agreement as a way to talk about "What is the problem with misreading history?" The problem is people will use it to justify action. North Macedonian's in-your-face Hellenism isn't just that they admire and want to borrow Greek culture and pretend it is their own. It is that their politicians have stated on multiple times they want to rebuild historical Macedon -- and that means taking "back" several Greek provinces.

However, the last big Prespa demonstration was in February and was a mostly peaceful affair, consisting largely of a really huge crowd waving an amazing number of Greek flags.

What I want for the scene I'm writing is what I've seen on several videos; police formed up phalanx-style behind riot shields, tossing tear gas grenades ahead of them, whilst protestors often in masks hurl petrol bombs to try to slow them down.

But this acts out mostly in the district around the Polytechnic, where students revolted against the Junta in 1973 (yes, they have regular marches to commemorate that and they often turn violent) and the shooting of a young man by cops in 2008. You could almost see these as a territorial dispute between the authorities -- who at this point are a purported left-wing party that turned out to be way more centrist, indeed accommodating, than expected -- against the surprisingly organized Anarchists.

I'm fine with moving dates a little, but it strikes me as dishonest to have this kind of street violence erupt around the wrong demonstration and not quite in the right part of town.

Okay, and there was a sort of counter-nazi demonstration that happened at about this time. But with all the delays in getting to this scene, a bunch of detours into the decorations on the gates of Schliemann's house and other research, and a crazy work schedule for the next few weeks, I unwisely closed those tabs without saving links. So now I have to track that down again from scratch.

And oops, I just found it. Mid-late September, violence, antifa and Golden Dawn all in one bundle. No Macedonian/FYROM stuff but I can't have everything. Oh, and my subconscious was running it's mouth; I have two characters that need new names now. Minor characters, fortunately, and one of them has been going by a nickname for most of the scenes he's in anyhow.

Wooah

So I was thinking about Tintin.

Like authors of a lot of similar serial fiction, Herge knew how to throw in a little action on a regular basis. If the bad guys were so far away he couldn't just have a guy with a gun come in through the door, he'd throw in a speeding taxi or a falling piano.

See, I started this story as a way to do Relic Hunter like adventures with lots of physical action in exotic locales yet not quite go full pyramidiot with the archaeology. And, yeah, I ran into an old problem. I'm always too conservative. When I wrote Shirato I intended to have space fleets clashing and cities burning. So I got two ships in a one-sided duel and no cities managed to catch fire. Did set fire to a moon, though.

Well, by the end of the story Penny is solo-sailing a boat across the Aegean and ends up fighting a giant mook in brutal hand-to-hand. Okay, losing. Quickly. But anyhow! Part of the problem is the plot ramps up slowly. There are long stretches without any action more adrenaline-filled than running for a train. I spent the day toying with the idea of upping the action, putting in a little more crazy, even if it was just random incidents.

And that's why the result of today's work has been to throw out a scene I already wrote.

Penny's no longer going to get sick on the ferry from Venice. Instead she's going to play hide-and-seek. Which means I actually get to show the bad guy. And that means he's actually seen briefly in Munich, and is no longer quite the Diabolus ex machina (mixing roots again, are we?) And not only does that make him stronger and more interesting, and makes him more of a constant presence, not only does that make Penny look smarter instead of being surprised by him at every turn, it also means I bump up the character progression of Herr Satz up as well and he gets more on-screen development.

And I took the time to write down all the fox related phrases I thought might be useful. Fox and hounds, the quick brown fox (pretty sure Travis McGee used that one already), and one that is half tempting to use for the current book; The Fox Knows Many Things. Which has shown up in the narrative already, although no-one has gotten around to giving the whole quote. Maybe because none of my characters are that interested in comparing themselves to Hedgehogs?

Oh, right. That came about because Japan would be an interesting if potentially difficult setting for a story, and there is of course the Inari Shrine and fox spirits and whatnot. I'm re-thinking having the Very British one be next, as I sort of want to have Athena Fox being, well, Athena Fox successfully before The Play That Goes Wrong happens.

Yeah, I'm still writing the Space Werewolf one first.

Dorians with waving plumes

Seriously, are there any easy scenes in this thing?

Okay, sure, there was a scene at a taverna in which the most complicated thing I had to do was describe the sirtaki. And I had to look up the hora because I had forgotten what you called it.

Edited my mad student conversation down to 2,000 words. Finished today a thousand-word draft of the last real thing I'm going to say about the Dorian Invasion. I'm still closing browser tabs on Schliemann and Thule Society and all that.

That's the thing, though. At 500 words a day the research is over-running the writing. I'm in the middle of re-reading a bunch of pages and articles I found several months back so I can get the details right on going to look for a musician in the Electronica scene who is currently living at the abandoned City Plaza Hotel.

And turns out I don't have to totally abandon the airport. A lot of the people at City Plaza came from Ellinikos. And do not remember it fondly. Still a pity I don't get to show it, though, with that glorious palimpsest of refugee camp on top of Olympic Village on top of abandoned airport (which used to be a major USAF base -- they got it from the Luftwaffe).

There's a museum there too, now, to Olympic Airways, that failed state-owned airline that for a time was made magnificent by Aristotle Onassis, whose family is inspiration for the villain of the novel, and who at one time was married to Maria Callas who also got a mention in the novel. Did I mention that in history, everything seems to connect to everything?

Either that or I have too damn much in the thing. One of those upcoming edit passes is going to be a #4 screen. I want to keep the big, important details and dump as much as I can, out.

Mass unmarked graves of countless mechanical bears

Finally got the scene where the sordid history of the Dorian Invasion theory is described. And I can't seem to find the research I had, particularly specifics about how it got picked up by certain authors in Germany and became part of the whole Aryan Origin nonsense.

Well, I guess the details don't matter so much. The Dorians are prominent in the story only because they are the Atlantis stand-in for this one; some pseudo-archaeological theory that can be chased after for a while.

In fact, the point I wanted to make about why ownership of history can matter is being made by something rather different. I'd been researching what was happening in Athens that month to find some amusing incidents and I discovered there was a referendum on the Prespa Agreement that weekend. Well, actually the referendum was not in Greece. And the big demonstrations were in Thessaloniki, not Athens. But given the Athenian's fondness for demonstrations, I doubt anyone will complain if I have a small riot anyhow.

I'd also been reading up on the abandoned buildings near the National Archaeological Museum I'd noticed when I was in the area myself. And between those and a few other things I have a couple chapter's worth of almost-getting-in-trouble before my protagonist actually does get in bad with the cops.

So in short North Macedonia (generally referred to by Athenians as "FYROM," "Skopje" or even "Skopia" (for their capital) and, when stressing their non-Greek ethnicity, "slavs,") is the bit of heritage claiming and openly irredentist mythologizing. And there's so much fun stuff there. And, yes, Alexander the Great is all over this. Which makes me look like I had planned it all along because as early as Chapter Two I had an out-of-nowhere conversation about the meeting between Alexander and Diogenes. And that's not the only mention, either.

(Quora has been extremely helpful in this. In a whole range of threads about Greek history and language, some Skopje fanatic just has to pop up -- seriously, they are as bad as the Flat Earthers who also keep crashing other threads -- to argue about how Alexander wasn't Greek and/or the people of the former Yugoslavia are as Macedonian as Thessalonikans. What I am after as a writer after all isn't the bare facts, but the ways people talk about them. The common arguments, the language used, the kinds of put-downs.)

Yeah, I did the Athenian Student scene. 3,000 words of arguing about politics. I realized part-way in all the voices were too alike so made one of them swear a lot, and since they had made a big deal of speaking English he is mostly swearing in that language, and very creatively. So he turned out to be a lot of fun to write for. However! I tried to put in too much, lost focus, and the voices aren't clear enough, and there's some basic timing issues. So I will probably keep his idioms, even whole exchanges, but the entire conversation has to be re-done.

The big LA project arrives in our shop early next week. I'm not sure I'll have draft done by the end of October.

Metaxas

Finished first draft of the crazy scene with a bunch of Athenian art students arguing about politics and identity. That was fun. But it has made me understand better why the detail I've been putting in is a problem.

Basically, I've been writing at the edge of what I understand. So that's bad because you should always know more than you put in. The reason for this buffer is so you have control. So you can nuance and be selective. If all you know is on the page, that margin is gone.

And here's the flip side of that. That means I'm writing for the reader who can see where I've fallen flat. If there is a reader who can absorb everything I've put in, it is unlikely that reader is exactly as informed as I am. Instead they are going to know some aspects more deeply than I. So what they are going to experience is strange omissions, skewed focus, and outright mistakes.

And I am doing no favors for the reader who is less informed, either. If they try to understand everything I have put down, the will discover the text is too thin at the edges. The detail is lacking, the explanations aren't as good as they could be. Because of course they've found the place where I, too, am struggling.

So it is better if the text is pitched for a simpler approach. For a more focused view of topics that I feel comfortable enough in to explore alternate ways of talking about them until I have found what is most powerful and most clear.

Having subjects that are under my full control means I can treat them in essay fashion, introducing the topic, developing it, providing example and counter-example, then recapping.

What I am writing right now is history-based story. The central plot engine is similar to that of a mystery; there are questions which are slowly answered. So, sure, I can throw in side quests and red herrings, from Metaxas to Metaxa, but in the end the primary focus and support will be on the facts of the case. Presented in full, explored, revisited.

+ + +

Oh right, health. Too early to say anything. I'll have more news Thursday.

Sanguinary

I'm moving ahead again on the novel. The one thing that has definitely gotten faster is the cycle between thinking it is shit and thinking it makes a decent read.

I came this close to buying a reference book on Greek ceramic art but wrote the scene without it. This is the museum chapter I've been intending since basically page one. One more section to go but I had to pause to think about Schliemann.

Well, not so much what I know about Schliemann. Although I refreshed and I had forgotten some interesting tidbits. Such as we possibly have him to blame for the current symbolism of the swastika. No, the question I'm on right now is whether my protagonist knows the full story of Schliemann or whether this is a good place to give her a little lecture on how Indiana Jones is a bad model for archaeology.

On the way bumped into another wonderfully Croftian setting. A "labyrinth" (that was the history show, not me) network of caves under Crete, parts of it used by the Germans to store munitions, closed up until a few years ago...and when they opened it, first thing they saw is the Germans didn't take all their bombs with them. There's some archaeology there too but this particular show is a bit lugubrious and they haven't gotten to that yet.

Oh, and all that got me dropping a few more notes on the adventure with the working title The Aurelius Dupondius.

I have nothing like a plot yet. Just the likely elements; Romans, London, coin collectors, violence. And a sort-of-theme; "Reality ensues." This is the one where pretending always goes wrong. This idea started for me as a running gag; brits always seem so capable in spotting attempts to fake an accent. It even shows up as a gag (multiple times) in Doctor Who, so it is a trait they are aware of themselves. So this is the one in which every attempt to run a bluff or a Chinese Fire Drill fails, every physical stunt ends the way they usually do on YouTube...all the way out to violence having real implications and lingering effects.

But that's probably not the next book. I think it just might be Badgers. That's the name of the work file...in the back of my head is a better working title; Full Metal Werewolf. Because it is basically transhumanist milSF with a horror twist. And the more you think about it, the closer those three really are already.

(Although Full Metal Jackal -- although it doesn't hint the horror genre tropes aspect -- is a very useful thought towards developing the background of "Dave." If you really wanted to gene-tinker soldiers around pack hunters, is wolf really the best template? What about hyenas?)

(And yes, whatever I do is going to be both for relatively sensible reasons and still deconstructed to hell and gone. No vet thinks highly of the super-soldier myth, and anyone who has actually studied military history and tactics is going to be going "why would I want a better Rambo if I could have a soldier that better integrated with an effective combined arms approach?")

Oh, yeah, and something snapped and I was finally able to get out of bed and get some work done. Which included getting to the doctor and I'm on another new drug. I am hopeful but not sanguine. And will be getting a lot more blood drawn either way.

Lost a lot of work hours, though, so money is going to be tight for a while.



"Apocalypse Howl" is also amusing...but makes me think of Alan Ginsberg, not Urban Fantasy.

Dam

I'm in an ugly place right now. Some kind of cold I just can't break. Sleeping in when I can, exercising when I can, and none of it makes a difference. Still tired all the time, concentration shot. No point -- well, no immediate point -- in going to the doctor. I am due for blood screen and annual so I need to go, give blood, wait a week, go again, get vitals, wait a few more weeks...they've got to go through the motions unless I am actually bleeding on the floor. And at the moment, that's just one more chore to drag down what little strength I can muster so no thanks to all of it.

Still struggling to keep my work hours up (is slack time right now but a huge project is rolling towards us. Which may actually make it easier.)

And struggling to finish the book. I have no confidence about it right now. And I can't talk about that with anyone because I'll just get the same "Well, you should have planned it more carefully" (half the stuff I've learned I couldn't have found in planning. It had to be found in text). And of course, "Beside, why are you writing such a stupid idea? Why don't you write this much better idea I just happened to think of at this moment which of course is totally a good idea and will work well as a novel." GTFO. I am so TIRED of that crap.

This is the best of what I can do. I did the process, I followed every step to the best of my ability. I've been hitting the books for decades so no, I don't need to read the goddamn book on "How to write your first novel its so easy" you just found on the bestseller list and loved.

All of my writer instincts are telling me dump it, throw it away. And the instinct above that is saying there's no point in even trying, I haven't got it and it is too late for me to learn it now. But one tiny Pandora-moth-sized instinct at the bottom of all of that is saying don't do anything rash. Finish first. Just finish.

And I'm trying. I finally broke through and kicked out first twenty words, then six hundred, then another six hundred. And I'm trying very hard not to let the perfectly natural process of having to explore a little the motivations of a new character and read up a little on the geography of the setting put the brakes on that tiny but forward motion.

I've done a 10K chapter over 2-3 days before. I should be able to get through this in a month. But every time I open the text it just feels both impossible and pointless.

Well, off to trying again. While I see if my gut can handle a little breakfast...

My Kingdom for a Kri-Kri

Academia.edu and the other site where I get scientific papers have been ramping up their notifications. So much lovely stuff on Late Bronze Age economies. Can't even read them right now.

+ + +

Still have not put down words for any of the 30,000 or so that finish the novel. However, today I managed to work out the chapter plan out to the end of the book and it is so much stronger than what I would have been fleshing out earlier in the week, I'm going to mark this down, again, to instinct telling me I wasn't ready yet.

Oh, and I keep bumping into things that make me think of how poor this idea was. Latest bugbear is that not only did I write but I plotted for someone other than a young woman traveling alone. There's a level of care and awareness that is drilled into female travelers, and so many situations that play out just differently enough they should be commented on, if not actually changing the plot. Not saying that travel is unsafe. Well, no more than home is. I visited a number of resources for the female traveler while I was still in the plotting stage and they all speak strongly for not being afraid to be a solo traveler.

But that's what I just got reminded. That there is fear. Not for everyone, not in all situations, but she really should not have been striking out into unknown situations with the same blitheness I would. Once again, I'm writing too much me.

+ + +

And still being sickly. Walked to work every day last week but also most of the week and all of the weekend was so exhausted by early afternoon I'd have to take a long nap. My doctor has run out of ideas. Trouble is, all the idiot lights are green; blood chemistry good, blood pressure, heart rate, oxygen uptake; all the easy-to-measure stuff says I'm fine. It is one of those things that can sneak up on you. I can't say I'm worse than I was yesterday. It isn't that obvious. But looking back over calendars and time clocks and blog posts, I have lost WAY more ground over this past year than mere "you are getting older" can account for.