I'm not entirely unhappy with it. Of course it was never going to live up to the potential of a petty crook gone nuts with one of those fancy fantasy swords and my Penny -- still in the costume she borrowed from a Pantomime theatre -- has to try to defend herself using half-remembered stage combat tricks...on the very stage of Shakespeare's Globe!
This book, too, takes the Nth hour turn to the weird. She was all about digging dirt and looking for a cheap room up until the last third. Then suddenly she's doing midnight rappels and other crazy business.
I'm also not entirely happy I'm now standing at 68K. I meant to hit 60K at the III-IV break, with the book finishing as short at 70-75K.
Also worked on my Wordpress site. Either they've changed something or I've figured it out because it became less annoying to put in text and add illustrations. That's one of the things I wanted to do. Really, it isn't going to accomplish much as an Author Site, but for my own amusement I wanted to put up some of the photographs and charts from planning this, these, well now three novels.
Writing Down the Sherds
Another of the random thoughts that came was how few women are in the London book. I mean that have speaking roles beyond "Here's your coffee." Really, only Sarah, Cynth, and Susan Morris. Jean Patrick (the professor from U. Leicester) is prominent in the first chapter but then drops out of the story. Cynth was only in there for the Battersea scenes but I think she made more of an impact on the story.
Well, there's forty things in the air for the final IWM London scene and I still haven't figured out the best order to get at them. It is another Traveling Salesman problem; there is no solution that optimally follows all paths without doubling back. According to my notes, we have to explain that Wentworth vanished, Linnet is going to Wanborough Manor, and Clarissa McDougal got her Lens from Mentor of Arisia (Linnet is a science fiction fan). Mick is going to talk some more about Zero Rooms and so forth, and explain who the heck Orde Wingate is, and if he has time left over he's going to attempt to explain some Cockney Rhyming Slang.
And, yeah, this is all essential to the plot! The plot is a web, a skein of connections. Penny went into this with a false choice between play-acting an archaeologist or being an archaeologist, and the division was made more artificial by the way she found herself working at a CRM firm (the boring end of commercial archaeology) and having fun in London with her friend Graham. So everything from Panto to the reenactors at IWM London has a part in describing the boundaries of this seeming choice.
Sigh.
Maybe the Japan novel will be simpler. Maybe I can finally figure out a way to plot that doesn't end up with these briar patches.
Another reason I'm not sweating things like paid editors, beta readers, Amazon reviews and author websites. I don't have confidence that my writing is worth it yet.
Oh, come on! How could I forget about Nyvoni Brent from the museum, Helen and Martha (who were kids at the time of the Blitz), and sure not-actually "Molly Malone" and the other one were only there for a scene but, right, should really be counting Linnet.
So, okay. There are some women in the book.
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