Faith

I will continue to write, to bleed, to sweat, and to scream for this book.  I have faith that it will be worth it.  That Yeshua gave me a talent for story telling.  That it will all be worth it.  Or else, why do I spend each night trying to make this book as beautiful as it can be?  Here is to faith and hope and that I make sure not to leave love out of the mix.  In spite of the frustrations and weariness, this is fun, I love doing this.  I hope we can all say that about what we do.

A quote I did not forget about, but had lost its exactness and, failing miserably, tried to paraphrase for the past two years

“We are nowadays surprised to find that such an official bit of work, made "to order" by a court poet for a special occasion, should be good poetry. But in ages when the arts had their full health, no one would have understood our surprise. All the great poets, painters, and musicians of old could produce great work "to order." One who could not would have seemed as great a humbug as a captain who could navigate or a farmer who could farm only when the fit took him.”

C.S. Lewis--Reflections on the Psalms (Chapter 12)

Boy does this give me a headache

After a suggestion from a friend, I decided to take another look at chapter one.  I feel like an idiot.  The story is there.  Beautiful.  I love it.  But every time I read those first two chapters, there are times where the flow breaks down and just sounds like crap.  Well, after my friend saying the flow was rather choppy I deciding to really scrutinize my work.  Ha, my work, as if anything is truly mine.  But that is a good thing.  Anyway, I realized that I was not consistent with the POV.  This story is third person, yes, but told from the POV of two characters (never in the same chapter).  So why, do I have paragraphs at various point containing third person omniscient POV describing things in a way for the reader.  No no no.  If this is from a character’s POV then some items, or situations, would not be described in such a way.  Which of course, was why flow, especially in the first chapter, was so damn choppy.  Hopefully, I fixed that.  But we will see.

The Should Haves

The Should Haves sit before Medusa's Box, contemplating philosophy and art while animated Camo sheds blood. Their finger's lazily pluck the Lyre's strings while their hearts lust after imaginary gold and pseudo experience. Time whips them by, across the face, over their dusty hearts. Youth turns into decrepit zombies as the songs of later and eventually drum drum hum, over and over in their minds. Opinions grow and become more profound. Words uttered carelessly to eager ears who hear but never listen. "Where are the artists and inventors history promised us?" They will eventually cry, X-Box controller limply hanging from one hand, netbook and iphone in the other. They will continue to scream their questions and cry, never realizing that Hephaestus, their lord and savior, idol and lover, gave them beautiful minds but crippled all ambition. They will weep and cry, realizing that yes, they should have done more, but where and when was the time? There were games to be played, sites to be surfed, virtual heroes to be sung into MMO history, and porn to be searched. Certainly, we should have, they will cry, but it would have been pointless because, well, it would be someone else's fault. Someone else's fault. But such reason won't keep the truth at bay or the bullet from the brain. Should have...should have...should have.

Alas, another update

Well, after much debate within myself (and numerous rejections from agents) I decided to scrap the prologue, and intensely edit the book( for the last time I hope), but mainly the first two chapters.  So far, I am greatly satisfied with that decision.  Thanks to the Lord Above, I realized that the first chapter, especially the first three pages, really needs to pop, grab the reader by the throat and sink its vampiric fangs of literary devices into his gentle throat.   I felt that not only did the prologue not do that, but couldn’t.  Maybe the prologue is something I will add years after publication, kind of a rerelease with added text as many authors before have been so blessed to do.  I should be so blessed.

In two weeks, I have finally finished my endeavor, and, to my satisfaction, edited the first two chapters.  I feel better about the changes.  Not a lot of changes mind you, but some clean up here and there, primarily with dialog involving the main character and his friends.  I really believe it flows better, brings muscle, sinew, and blood to the skeleton of each character.  I am not sure if friends that have read it prior to this change will agree, or even notice, but the change was for me.  I was not one hundred percent satisfied with the first two chapters, and recently, and through much soul searching and prayer, have discovered that I cannot write to appease an imaginary audience.  First and foremost, I must be happy, no, ecstatic about this story.  The only other soul on my mind should be Yeshua who has lovingly, and patiently been my muse (don’t get me wrong, I would never lower the Lord of All to a single title).  Writing and spinning this tale has been mind numbing, leaving me hard pressed, sometimes depressed, and many times, pulling out hair.  But I wouldn’t change this process for anything. 

Tomorrow, (wow, back to back posts, is it possible?) chapter one.