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Message: <blockquote data-quote="takyris" data-source="post: 1343471" data-attributes="member: 5171">Sorry to hijack.  On the one hand, some of the comments hit close to home, because the idea for this novel was a direct result of me saying, "You know, I'm coming close to writing stuff I wouldn't want to read out of a desire to be seen as Good and Intriguing by all the writing folks I hang out with.  I need to bring back the fun goofy stuff I'm actually good at."On the other hand, I completed a draft of my novel on Sunday, which means that you could ask me about how to get dog-poop out of the treads of your sneakers and I'd find a way to work my novel into it ("Well, ideally, a sharp stick and then something rough, like a welcome mat, which reminds me, in the novel I completed just last week, I had this great scene where the hero compares the villain to ostrich dung...").As for web stuff: Nope, since I'm planning to rewrite it and send it to editors, and putting it up on the web raises questions about prior publication.  It's just generally considered a no-no.  When I send it to my buddies, I usually do it from a secure, out-of-the-way FTP site.  My slightly out-of-date website has links to two of my short stories online, though: <a href="http://patrick.wuut.net" target="_blank">http://patrick.wuut.net</a>As for review copies: How about when I get done with the next draft?  You know the one where I added a setting, fixed the enormous plotholes, figured out the voice I want my characters to use, and made the prophecies coherent?  One of the reasons I actually finish novels is the fact that I'm not afraid to write a really lousy first draft.  I can't fix something that isn't done yet. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Mallus: Just do it.  Sit down every day and don't get up until you've got 500 (or 1000, or 250, or whatever) words cranked out.  And don't go back to fix things up unless you need to fix a glaring plothole.  Keep moving forward.  (Um.  This is what works for me.  YMMV)As for elaboration: Don't even get me started.  What I will say is that after writing one of these swashbuckler dealies, I understand why every swashbuckling movie has a stage-coach fight.  Coach fights kick ASS.  And on the snob note, I reread P&P so that I could outline the plot events, and I was amazed, upon reading it with new eyes, at how incredibly sarcastic and angry Austen was.  She was writing something revolutionary, showing how the supposedly passive women could scheme and plan just as much as the supposedly active men, and she was just enormously peeved at all the unfairness of it -- and she managed to turn that anger into a kickass love story.I don't capture that, not by a long stretch, but if I can find some way to take that idea and at least use it to be true to what I want my own story to be, that would rock.</blockquote>

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