Watcher, second draft complete!

Watcher (book two in the G3 Whistleblower Series), second draft complete.

 

Came to 65,000 words, which is comparable in length with its 2013 predecessor Tandem (book one in the G3 Whistleblower Series).

 

And by 'second draft complete' I mean, "It's done," there's not much I'll add to it at this point, apart from a more refined word selection or turn of phrase, I've already taken out a lot of swear words that weren't necessary. I have one final thing to do before I send it through the Chimericana Books publishing process.

 

RUICHI SAKAMOTO's Three CD.

 

I played this excellent CD, when I first got it, for almost every Tandem writing session. It really set the mood and the atmos of what became a character-written piece. No concern for story or narrative cleverness. Just the joy of writing the central characters, Lorien Howell and Actor Arrenay aka...

 

I'm gonna go through Watcher with this CD playing and see if Tandem's atmos, mood, freeformness can't be evoked again in the final tidy of this second G3 Whistleblower book. In fact, I'm going to read/tidy the chapters backwards because it's the back end of the book that's supposed to tie in with the start of Tandem. You'll understand when you read it.

 

Watcher will be available through Amazon and all other online distributors by early in the week; ebook, kindle, kobo, itunes, paperback, all the formats.

LEAPS AND BOUNDS - Spanish Eyes - adjusted cover

it sometimes takes me a few months of intense thinkage before embarking on a book project, but once I get going I don't fuck about.

 

Houston, "We've just breached the FIFTY THOUSAND WORDS mark," that's over ten thousand words since the most recent update on this blog and I'm kinda starting to understand how this book might end, and more importantly WHY. Even with that utterly-Earth-shattering narrative-twist surprise ending I wrote a few weeks back and didn't wanna put in the book in case it just seemed like a cop-out. Seems though I'm loathe to follow some sort of organised plan, my mind wants to drag this G3-whistleblower narrative back to the OPPENHEIMER WAR WORLD scenario of book 1, Tandem.

 

Watcher is really book 2 in a trilogy; well, technically, book one. But it works better having been brought out in this order. Tandem first, then Watcher, then Kumiko (book three) which is going to be TOTALLY MENTAL because of all the radical ground work already laid by these preceding WAR WORLD novels.

 

Watcher novel - major narrative upheavals - now links with Tandem novel

Hmm,

so I had some plans for the Watcher narrative, and what happened? The book took over. This has happened several times in my writing career. The book (or the characters) dictating where the story should go.

Same just happened.

I had a stack of ideas and a stack of narrative turning points (including two amazing twists in the tale) and recent developments suggest these were Red Herrings, which is kinda good because the novel looks more authentic i.e. less contrived, when I (the writer) believe it to be one thing when it's conspiring behind me to be something else. I've gone back in and edited the start a little but not to any grotesque extent, I mean it's not corny; just tidied.

 

It's still about G3 or the Global Gambling Game, but it's got teeth now, skin and bones and a brain, not just pretty face paint.

 

I love it when this happens, when I'm forced to realise what it is I'm actually writing, and that makes the process of Discovering A Novel really interesting - never a dull moment. Writing novels (for me) is, and should be, an organic process; the fact that the story is being dictated by the characters' actions tells me I'm on the right track. This is certainly not 'writing by numbers'. This is dangerous. This is on the edge. This is scary. And Watcher now it ties in to Tandem (G3 Whistleblower novel #1) more intimately; we even discover how The Market began... who Lorien Howell really is.

 

As I pass the 33,000 words mark, I realise I'm probably about half way through my projected storyline for this book - just depends how the new narrative content folds itself into the mix. How the book climaxes. How much patience I have not to involve any Kumiko (G3 Whistleblower novel #3) material at this early stage.

 

 

37,000 words mark UPDATE: so, I've had a couple of good writing days, really intense stuff, some wild and wonderful content ... and I'm wondering how much of it I'll retain. It's alright, there's nothing wrong with the writing, it's just that it might have gone a little too 'off piste'. I can't really tell yet, but I've got a lot of material to work with at least. A lot more crafting'll be necessary, before the emerging stoyline properly reveals itself.

Stalker's Guide To... novel renamed to WATCHER novel.

I've written about five chapters i.e. 15,000 words, of the Stalker's Guide To... novel, and I'm wondering if the title is even relevant any more.

 

I'll do this, I'll start a project with a 'concept' in mind. Then, as the project finds its way, its feet, its own writing style, concerns, narrative, character that title sometimes falls by the wayside.

 

It happened with the Free Planet novel ... it was only ever meant to be One Novel. It was first called One Of Us then You The People then Free Planet then I structurally went in and did a bit of split-narrative cleverness where both You The People and The Custodians shared the honour; ended up realising it was Book One of a series and called this first part Custodian.

 

Stalker's Guide To... first started out as a conceptualised or parody of the Lonely Planet Guide To... (BBC travelogue series from the 1990s) that showed you how to survive on a holiday budget at so-called holiday destinations like New York, Paris, Guatemala. The idea was to lay it all out, in fact play out the narrative, like the BBC TV series, using the same language and style to fold these budget holiday locations into the story.

 

Didn't work.

 

Almost as soon as the first chapter got written/re-written it became obvious (to me) that there was a better story here about just one crammed city. The unnamed (possibly Japanese) urban city sprawl the novel became set in. It's like I wanted to revisit the missed opportunity I tried to give myself when I brought back a couple of empty notebooks from my 15-years-ago trip to Kyoto/Nara.

 

City sprawl, and time manipulation, I'm going to revert to an early title I had for the 3D game (I prototyped up but never made) called WATCHER.

 

WATCHER's also got some structural connection to 'what the central character uses', not just what he is, on his quest to save eight VIPs.

STALKER'S GUIDE TO relaunch - new writing month, new writing regime - distraction rules

of course there was a false start.

 

There always is, even with the 'best laid plans' and all that. Things never go the way we plan them, or 'dream them'.

 

Last month's nightmarish setback notwithstanding, I decided to 'leave it alone' for a few weeks, get over my failure at remember the full dream transcript of a novel I'd yet to write, achieve some sort of zenlike distance from my dreamy over-closeness to the material. That wasn't even how the book would have gone, it's never the way my writing process works. I just wanted it done, is all, and my dreaming mind delivered a product that had no soul, yet.

 

Reassess. Re-distract. Re-focus on the important things in life, well, in writing, namely - getting busy. When I get busy, I want to be doing something else.

 

So, I decided to start the REAPER novel, free planet #3, the third part of the trilogy. Decided all the action must take place on one day, eight months after the events of book #2, Liberator. Now that Reaper's in the writing stage, I want to start writing this book, this STALKER'S GUIDE TO... and it'll work, I tell you. With this new direction and these new ideas, I'm likely to bang right into it all fingers blazing like little Victorian pistons.

 

Damn, this is gonna rock!