Hi no youjin

Well, this proofs the idea of having boots-on-the-ground experience. So far all of the action of the story has been in a part of Kyoto I didn't really explore. But the ryokan is informed by the ryokan and minshuku I stayed at, all the way up to Hanae copying my own landlady with a fondly exasperated "Kawaisou!"

And the atmosphere of the hole-in-the-wall place Penny eats her first meal at is based on the feel and what (very) few details I could remember from my first meal in Kyoto.

Here's two bits, though; when she is falling asleep the first night she hears the cry of the volunteer fire wardens making their rounds. That's a detail I haven't seen in any of the research I've done from home. (In fact, it was extremely difficult to track down the actual phrase they were using). I knew about that because I'd been there. Just like I know that when you get downtown in Kyoto the crosswalk lights play a traditional and oddly minor-key sounding Japanese song. (Which song, I haven't tried to track down yet.)

I'm around 7K in draft now makes it a bit under 1/10 of the projected length of the novel. And taking a break because I'm at a place where I could drop 500-700 words on a Kabuki performance but I don't know if I should.

At this point I really don't know what is working. It feels rushed and like there's still too much nihongo in it although I went through and deleted a bunch again. It is so very hard to describe Japan in words. The look of the place, that is. And worse when I'm throwing so many contrasts at the reader.

I mean, I am very consciously starting her in the traditional part of Kyoto, putting her in a ryokan and staying away from department stores and pachinko and robots and even keeping her away from English speakers. 

But you still can't help but have an experience that veers all over the map. Sigh. If I was filming this, I'd just start the whole thing at Toei Eigamura and then only gradually allow anything modern in the picture.

***

Most of the reviews I traded for at Pubby have posted. One them got taken down again by Amazon. I think. I just remember the number being higher, then going away. I have just enough to balance out that damned 1-star now until it doesn't look fatally bad. On the other hand, two of the reviewers mentioned the "choppy" narrative and the third complained about typos.

I won't say there aren't any of the later, but these reviews are so brief and I don't have any way to contact them so I have no idea if he was running into slang, British spelling, or just plain unfamiliar words -- or if he really did hit a few of the ones I know are there and they bugged him. Or if he felt a need to say something -- he still gave me five stars.

Terrible thing about Pubby -- my review of THEM is no better than three stars -- is that the writer is asked to provide descriptive words, favorite scenes...a whole page of basically Cliff Notes to crib from so the reviewer doesn't even have to read the book. I think their system is slipshod. My last reviewer was required to purchase his own copy. According to Pubby, he did. According to my sale figures, nobody has done so in a month or more.

And there's a monthly fee for the service. I want to use the credits I've saved up to "splash" Wedding a little, but I don't see it even reaching first draft sooner than three months from now.

Well, at least I have all the scenes planned out -- research and all -- to get me through the next several chapters.