Things have been moving along well on the book #2 front.
All that work earlier resulted in me completing, for want of a better term, a Prologue for book #2. It’s really three sub-plots that occur slightly before or at the same time as events in chapter 1. Comments on it so far have been complimentary, which is really a relief.
Just minutes ago I completed the first draft of chapter 1, Danger. This gets our main characters, Archer and Hieronymus into the story and gets book #2 really rolling along. It was fun to write and came together way more easily than I ever imagined. I suspect that I’ve lived this story for so long and I now have a better grasp of the characters, they almost wrote themselves.
The Prologue and Chapter 1 were exciting to write as there were specific goals that had to be met for this, book #2, in order for the reader to follow the story. As with any series, the author needs to remember that many readers come into a series in the middle and must be caught up on the story in order to understand the events in the current book. As this is my first trilogy, let alone writing endeavor, its been another learning experience, weaving in back-story while simultaneously moving the new story along in a competent manner.
The imagination has been fertile this entire week. As well as working on chapter 1, I expanded the sub-plots enough that chapters 2 and 3 are both over half written as well. I don’t know how long it’ll last but I’m hoping as long as possible. So far I’ve written over 12k words (see handy progress bar to the right) and I’ve only been at it for about 3 weeks. Great progress so far. Much better than when I started book #1. I guess planning and preparation help.
It’s the Labor Day weekend here in the states, and with nothing pulling me away from writing, I’m hoping to complete the next 2 chapters over the next few days and move ahead on others.
Image: Another one of my favorite artists, Neal Adams. His clean, realistic drawings are simply amazing and I modeled much of my inking style on his whenever I could. I first discovered his work in the Creepy, Eerie, and later the Vampirella comics produced by Warren Publishing, and followed him to Marvel (X-Men) and later DC (Batman, Deadman, Green Lantern), later he did covers for Edgar Rice Burroughs Tarzan paperbacks, and nowadays does commercial design and animation work.
