The Name Game

r-avatarOn any team, different players have different strengths. In the case of Rune Skelley, one of Jen’s main strengths is naming — things, people, places, you name it (but not if she sees it first). This is good because Kent tends to be less than awesome at coming up with names.

This doesn’t prevent him from having opinions, though. So, once in a while, Jen will deliver a name that just doesn’t work for Kent. And it does matter if both writing partners aren’t on the same page about a name. After all, characters’ names are perhaps the most important things about them. No other aspect gets such heavy use, or is called on to signify everything else the reader knows in such a compact, almost invisible way.

These name-disagreement situations are uncommon, but we’re in the midst of one right now. They’re terribly awkward. There’s a sense of “Jen is the one who’s good at this, so she wins,” which we both know isn’t a solution. Kent is at a disadvantage to produce viable alternatives, so he feels stuck. We really don’t have a formal process for coping with them, other than trying to keep communications open and give each other time to adjust. So far it’s never led to arson.

Partnership is about trust and compromise. Working with the right partner, compromise can be a creative exercise.

Fleur’s Wicked Grin Told Me She Hoped I Didn’t Eat the Cicada

  • by Kentuncomfortably on all fours yet unheeding his discomfort
  • like an illusion of the vision
  • “Magnificent!” I replied, with a good imitation of enthusiasm
  • exhaustively trained monozygotic twins
  • Like his lips were made of chocolate

Tune in next time part 87                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

Fleur’s wicked grin told me that she hoped I didn’t eat the cicada, that she relished picturing me as a vanquished foe uncomfortably on all fours yet unheeding his discomfort in his fervor to please her. I opened my mouth, resolved to get this ordeal over with in the least of unpleasant ways. My determination disappointed her. Ordinarily I don’t fantasize about harming other people, but the vexation creasing Fleur’s brow was like an illusion of the vision of how she’d react if I turned the tables. Stoic to the last, my wife.

I chewed, willing away any and all awareness of the taste, texture, and especially the sound within my own mouth.

“How is it?” my father-in-law asked.

“Magnificent!” I replied, with a good imitation of enthusiasm.

Fleur surprised me by providing a goblet of red wine to wash things down. I reminded myself that she wasn’t a monster. She only wanted to be a good daughter.

“Next question,” her father said. “What is the proper manner to perform our tribal anthem?” He and Fleur exchanged nasty smiles.

I smiled back. “On a barge, held in place against the current by a team of thirty-one albino goats, the melody produced by a single bagpipe played by exhaustively trained monozygotic twins.”

The warlord had been certain I couldn’t know this. He frowned deeply. Like his lips were made of chocolate and my satisfied grin was a blowtorch.

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My Second Drugging In Less Than 12 Hours Brought Back Vivid Memories Of My Wedding

  • by jen“You don’t have to eat it.”
  • We’re going to make it look accidental.
  • the site of an extraordinary event
  • so soft and so elegant
  • stern, judgmental, and bossy

Tune in next time part 86                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

My second drugging in less than 12 hours brought back vivid memories of my wedding to Fleur. Her family made liberal use of narcotics and paralytics in all of their ceremonies.

You might think that the days of marriages arranged to strengthen political ties were long gone, but you would be wrong. During my mother’s second term as president she desired an ally amongst the stern, judgmental, and bossy warlords of Contraria, and so Fleur and I were forced to marry. I was assured that she would be so soft and so elegant, so unlike her father. I was lied to. Fleur was indeed elegant, but she was not soft. And while she did not resemble her father much physically, she was his protege in matters both political and temperamental.

I tried to convince Mother that my twin Jason would make a more appropriate groom, but she insisted that he had to be available to rap throughout the fortnight-long reception. And so for two long weeks the White House lawn and rose garden were the site of an extraordinary event, a bombastic celebration that resembled Burning Man more than a state wedding reception. Fleur and I exchanged our vows wearing only the floral headdresses of her people. Upon consummation of the marriage, our first Contrarian tribal question and answer session was broadcast on C-SPAN. Through the haze of drugs I overheard my mother and Fleur’s father plotting the bombing of Contraria’s eternal rival. “Don’t worry,” Mother assured the warlord. “We’re going to make it look accidental.”

Everyone knows how that worked out, of course.

And now, even after that debacle, and the sex scandal that killed my father and removed my mother from office in disgrace, I was still wed to Fleur, still subject to the violent traditions of her clan, still expected to produce an heir.

As the blowgun poison wore off I became aware again of the stuffy tent and the scratchy doily adhered to my groin. Fleur stood before me with a giant cicada pinched between two chopsticks. My punishment for getting my first question wrong.

“You don’t have to eat it.” My father-in-law fixed me with a smirk. “But the alternative is even worse.”

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Careful With That Axe Eugene

r-avatarEdits on the Music Novel were completed last night, to great fanfare and celebration. The kind of fanfare that sounds a lot like a satisfied sigh, and the kind of celebration that greatly resembles going to sleep. We finished up late, is what we’re saying.

Throughout the editing process, Jen went first, with Kent following along behind to neaten things up. If it were yard work, Jen would be on the riding mower and Kent would have the tiny little nail scissors to trim the stragglers. Except when we got to Chapter 17. When we got to Chapter 17, Kent was feeling feisty. He set his nail scissors carefully aside and got out the weedwacker and the flame thrower. Instead of one word here, one word there, he started yanking out clauses, sentences, and in a couple of cases, entire paragraphs. Several darlings gave their lives to the cause.

The carnage was a shock to Jen’s delicate system. She thought she understood how things worked (i.e., she was the vicious one), and to have the tables turned was painful. We took our time and worked through Kent’s reasoning (and he asked several times if a break would be a good idea), and made the necessary edits. And Jen can (almost) admit that he was right and the work is (probably) stronger now.

It’s important to have strong communication skills when you’re writing with a partner so that when you come across your own Chapter 17 you’re able to work through it as a team. And so that you want to keep working together. Respect and compromise are invaluable.

In the end we surpassed our arbitrary goal, removing 12.5% of the words we had so carefully written. Our next step will be to read through the finished manuscript and make sure we weren’t overzealous. That’s the other danger of swinging the sharp editing tools around — you might remove something that was better left in place.

Fleur’s Father Settled on the Satin Sheets

  • by KentWe’re living in the golden age
  • even without feathers
  • and now so am I
  • God I love you. You’re so pretty.
  • trembling with paralysis

Tune in next time part 85                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

Fleur’s father settled on the satin sheets between us, clipboard in hand. He smoothed the curling points of his mustache and then plucked a quill from the crest on his turban.

“True or false,” he began. “We’re living in the golden age of calligraphy.”

“False,” Fleur said confidently. Her father chortled indulgently and marked her response with an ironically elaborate symbol. Penmanship remained the most vital way for warlords of their clan to command respect, and any aspirant factional leader learned how to fashion suitable styli even without feathers for quills. Learned young.

He looked at me sternly for the next question. “You’re full of blank, and now so am I.”

I found myself unable to think of anything except the responses I should *not* say out loud, until finally I stammered, “C-cracker crumbs?”

The leathery face of my warlord-in-law leaned closer. “God I love you. You’re so pretty. But, no. That’s wrong.” One of his bodyguards raised a slender tube to his mouth and I felt the blowdart’s sting on my neck. “And as you’re fully aware, incorrect responses must not be permitted.”

I sat there, nude, with a doily on my lap, trembling with paralysis and dreading the penalty I must pay.

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As Dictated By the Customs of Her Clan

  • by jenthe sciences which keep men alive
  • producing a special voice for the occasion
  • wrist and knee
  • expression of the most abject and hopeless misery
  • the organic kind

Tune in next time part 84                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

As dictated by the customs of her clan, Fleur chanted passages from an ancient scroll entitled The Sciences Which Keep Men Alive while I made love to her, producing a special voice for the occasion. I concentrated my caresses on her left wrist and knee to increase our chances of producing a male heir. Neither of us wanted to face the expression of the most abject and hopeless misery her father would wear if a girl were born instead. It did not bear thinking of. Existential misery made him dangerous.

Soon our tent was filled with the organic kind of scent that comes from vigorous sex in hot climates. Fleur sighed happily and rang the gong. We barely had time to cover ourselves with the ritualistic doilies before her father strode in, flanked by his bodyguards.

The post-coital question and answer period was my least favorite part of this entire weeklong ceremony.

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52 Card Pickup

r-avatarEdits on the Music Novel continue apace. Jen is still bushwhacking, and she’s a handful of chapters ahead of Kent who is smack dab in the middle of the novel, doing more precision pruning. We’ve already passed the arbitrary word removal goal we set for ourselves, and it looks like we’ll have no problem shrinking the book by 10% by the time we’re done.

There are several approaches you can take when you’re editing, but you’ll get the most bang for your buck by finding big things to remove, like redundant scenes, superfluous characters, or even distracting subplots. Kill your darlings, as they say.*

The Music Novel has no superfluous characters or distracting subplots (because we’re awesome!), so we were left with routing out redundant scenes. And even those were hard to come by. There was only one scene that we removed entirely.

Since we like to present ourselves with challenges to keep our environment interesting, we took a good hard look at a series of scenes that occurred back-to-back and involved the same three characters. “These scenes are each individually spectacular!” we cried. “Nary a one is expendable! But surely there is a way to streamline the sequence!”

And lo, we were correct. By chopping those chapters into little pieces and throwing them all up in the air we were able to reassemble the components into a more pleasing shape. The pacing is better, tension escalates in a really effective way, and we saved ourselves 1200 words. Huzzah!

*no actual darlings were harmed during the production of this novel

Fleur’s Attire

  • by Kentsomeone other than Mother Nature
  • she’s not your typical Russian.
  • quantify my luck
  • took a large pinch of snuff
  • sleep through a blizzard

Tune in next time part 83                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

Fleur’s attire was as elaborate as mine, and considerably heavier. The dense brocaded fabric once allowed her to sleep through a blizzard when our tent blew away in the mountains. That year was memorable, but this promised to be a new high-water mark.

I unraveled the complex laces of her jodhpurs, reciting the proper chant. When I got to her belt I took a large pinch of snuff from its hidden compartment. When I sneezed onto her sleeve I created a speckled pattern to divine our procreative chances, to quantify my luck as a father as it were.

But my mind was still on Svetlana. She’s not your typical woman, and she’s not your typical Russian. Was her claim valid? How could she be so sure, unless she consulted with someone other than Mother Nature.

I blew a fanfare on each of the six pennywhistles sewn into Feur’s bodice. It was time.

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My Wife is a Very Dangerous Woman

  • by jenthis really is the end
  • “I am fucking drunk.”
  • covered the back window with the mattress
  • adroit little fingers
  • Open your eyes.

Tune in next time part 82                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

My wife is a very dangerous woman, but in sleep she looks quite peaceful. I prefer reality over the tranquil lie. It keeps me on my toes. I shook her shoulder and said, “Open your eyes.”

Her baby blues popped open and she hooked her adroit little fingers into my ears in a move I remembered well, and pulled me down into a kiss. Presumably she’d had one of her lackeys wipe off the residual bufotoxin earlier.

When she released me, I said, “Hello, Fleur. To what do I owe the honor?”

Her smile was as cold as I had ever seen it. “It’s that time of year again, darling. My underlings covered the back window with the mattress. I know you prefer privacy in these matters” She gestured to the rear of the tent where an air mattress was indeed covering the only window.

“Your father still insists you produce an heir?”

“You know Daddy.”

I thought of Svetlana’s claim that I had impregnated her on the train, and what my warlord father-in-law would think of a bastard child.

“I am fucking drunk.” Fleur informed me. “Let’s get this over with.”

She pinned me on my back and used her fingers, both adroit and not-so, to strip me out of my ceremonial pajamas. When she reached my feathered sock garters she said, “This really is the end of this silly costume, finally!” She snapped the garters three times in the prescribed manner, then removed them and laid down on her voluminous pillows. It was time for me to perform my half of the ritual.

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Close But No Cigar

r-avatarWe talked last time about our workflow for this revision pass, and the benefits of all the extra conversation. This time we’re going to come clean about a downside to this approach.

Stuff doesn’t always match up the way we want it to.

At least half the time our wordcounts or character counts don’t agree after we finish getting “synced up,” which leads to a rather laborious process of tracking down the discrepancy, which isn’t the most effective use of our time. And time is a very important commodity for us, so things that waste it are a major concern.

The silver lining, if there is one, is that this way we’re catching little errors that much sooner. If Kent handed over a file with “He went the store” in it, importing that would infect Jen’s copy of the manuscript with the mistake. Sure, it would get spotted on  a future read-through, but we sleep better knowing we’re on top of that stuff.

Having two people working on a project makes certain things more complex, and sometimes that makes them less efficient. We look at it as a cost of doing business, and we think the negatives are tiny compared to the positives.

What’s the biggest challenge you face in working with a co-author? If you’ve never done it, what’s the thing you’re most worried about?