Tag: The Witch Box

Losing a Day

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Do You Want To Build a Snowman? Physics Can Help | Science | Smithsonian Magazine

Okay, it wasn’t quite that cold yesterday. But it was cold enough.

Last year I finished writing Behold! on literally the last day I could have finished it–no more good weather until the spring.

Looks like I’m in the same boat this year.

Yesterday it threatened rain all day and was just too cold. Under 50 degrees, the ink just won’t come out of the pen. Today it’s under 50, but maybe I can find a sunny spot.

Some of you wonder why I have to write outdoors. Well, there are too many distractions indoors. The worst are those nuisance phone calls: “Hello! [in thick Indian accent you could cut with a knife] This is Brian O’Shaughnessy from Acme Spindulators…” Those just wipe out my concentration. Conversely, I find the trees and the sky and the birds good for my concentration. They help me see the scenes I’m writing about.

But I am definitely running short of days, so one more blog post and then maybe the sun will be high enough to create a warm spot for me somewhere. I’m dealing with a ship that’s been at sea for 40 years and I have to do something about it.

Well, saddle up, we’ve got a ways to go…

Just Missed the Storm (I Think)

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2,343 Storm Approaching Stock Photos, Pictures & Royalty-Free Images - iStock

Dark clouds have just swept in to veil the sun, the wind is coming on strong, and it’s getting cold: but I did get four more pages written. One more week of decent weather, and I should be able to finish The Witch Box.

I hated to stop today, but couldn’t help it. I’m really loving this climax (I warn myself again to drop no spoilers).

For my soul’s sake I have avoided the nooze so far today–I hope you don’t mind. It’ll find us soon enough.

P.S.: A certain quokka has reminded me to cheer you on to making comments–we only need a few dozen more to make 80,000.

Message delivered; and now it’s time to relax with a movie.

And here comes the rain. Missed me by just ten minutes.

Almost Done!

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6,764 Beach Bonfire Stock Photos and Images - 123RF

The rain stopped this afternoon, the sun came out, so I set up my chair and plunged into writing the other climax of my book, The Witch Box. I have to say “the other climax” because this book has two of them.

Now I’m excited. I think this book is my most ambitious writing project yet and I can hardly wait to see how readers respond to it. That’s something an author never knows until it’s too late to do anything about it. You either fly or flop.

Uh, what’s with the picture of the bonfire? Well, I needed one to set the scene, but that’s all I’m at liberty to tell you just now. Such a temptation to drop hints! But it’s just not wise to give in to it.

And after this (if it doesn’t flop), I’m definitely leaning toward going back in time to King Ozias…

One Climax Down, One to Go

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Newport+Beach+Sunrise+by+Vinda+Ho+t

The eye doctor dilated me six ways from Sunday this morning and I can’t see well, and a cold wind is blowing–but I’ve just come in from hammering out one of the twin climaxes of The Witch Box.

With the other one still to be written. The sun is not quite ready to set on this book.

I dare not let drop any spoilers here. Suffice it to say that this is a challenge to me as a writer–the most ambitious thing I’ve tried in any of my Bell Mountain books. I have no way of knowing whether I’ve succeeded. That’ll be up to the readers.

I hope I can finish the other climax next week, weather permitting. Then I’ll have to go back and fill in the hole that I left in the story when I decided to jump ahead to the pre-climaxes. It’s been a long time since I had to work this hard on a book.

In the meantime, I hope some of you get hold of Book No. 13, The Wind from Heaven, and let me know what you think of it. And next year, No. 14, Behold!, will be published.

After that, I’m seriously thinking of going back two thousand years to tell the tale of King Ozias, Obann’s last anointed king. He’s the one who set up the bell on Bell Mountain and thus may be held responsible for the 15 books that followed.

Sorry I’m Late!

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Ruined UK castles spring back to life | CNN Travel

Sorry I’m running so late today, but it was unavoidable: four errands to run this morning, including grocery shopping–and then I had to take advantage of the sunny weather to work on my book, The Witch Box.

As I work my way into the book’s double climax, the people settled around the ruined castle of Carbonek are about to yield to a temptation: not to trust entirely in God’s promise, but to try to beef it up with something more. Something of this world. They can’t help it. We’re always looking for some kind of insurance policy.

I have to do as much as I can this week, before cold weather really settles in. At the same time, I have to be careful not to force the story. I have to trust in God’s guidance–and that’s not always easy to do. Carbonek, I know how you feel.

I’m being drawn into the story. I don’t know how to say it any other way.

Hiking Toward the Climax

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It's Wrong to Tell Our Kids That Hard Work Always Pays Off | Time

I’m sorry that this blog isn’t quite so noozy today as it usually is, but I’ve just spent two hours outside filling up a legal pad with another five pages of The Witch Box.

Since I decided to jump ahead to that point in the story leading to its tricky double climax, I’ve written another 125 pages and now I’m ready to rock. If I can pull this off, I think it’ll be something I can be proud of.

So far I’m the only one who knows what will happen with the conqueror from across the western ocean. As for what is intended to be a final experiment with the witch box, only Wytt has any idea of just how exquisitely dangerous that will prove to be.

Well, I have to take care not to drop any spoilers. And I have to keep racing the calendar, trying to finish the book before it’s just too cold to write outside. Maybe I have two weeks. I pray that’ll be enough.

Now it’s 3 o’clock–just enough time to check in with Joe Collidge.

Here Comes the Sun!

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Grass with sunny spots. Summer grass with sunny spots. | CanStock

Ooh-ooh, the sun came out! I’ve got to get out there and set up my chair, light my cigar, and return to work on my book, The Witch Box. Yesterday I found a sunny spot and was able to write for 90 minutes before my hands got too cold.

I’m working my way into the plot’s double climax. All the characters are now where they need to be. (Yes, you have to move them around like chessmen.) And as yet I’m the only one who knows what’s going to happen to them. Wait’ll they find out.

I know I ought to write more blog posts, but I have to make use of the sun while I’ve got it. See yiz later!

Well, I Tried

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Why Do We Shiver When Cold? | Live Science

Even without the time I lost to voting today, the outdoors was cold and windy and indoors it was one confounded nuisance phone call after another.

But I tried. Got three pages done before I had to sound retreat.

The Witch Box will have two simultaneous climaxes, and I’ve been working my way toward them as best I can. If you think this sounds tricky, well, it is!

I pray for warmer weather the rest of the week.

A Hideous Giant Amphibian

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Wait’ll you read The Witch Box! I had no idea these scary giant amphibians could be found in Lintum Forest; but Helki the Rod has found them. He’s also dreamed up a constructive use for them

I don’t buy that “Eryops-on-a-balance-beam” act, though. What could be more preposterous? (Maybe a tightrope-walking tortoise.)

Anyway, try to imagine a critter like a cross between a frog and a salamander, weighing a couple hundred pounds, with jaws that’d make an alligator’s look downright feeble. That’ll put you on the right track.

Writing in Good Company

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Why is Tolkien Scholarship Stronger than Lewis Scholarship? Part 2: Literary Breadth and Depth | A Pilgrim in Narnia

J.R.R. Tolkien (left) and C.S. Lewis (right)

If there’s one thing that anyone who wants to be a writer ought to do, it’s read. A lot. Every day. Don’t stop.

As I race the calendar to finish writing The Witch Box, I find Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings to be just the company I need. I’ve grown out of consciously trying to imitate him or anybody else (imitating C.S. Lewis really is a fool’s errand); but what helps me in my own journey is the tone of Tolkien’s epic fantasy.

There are books that I love but dare not read while I’m working on a book of my own. That’s because a little bit of those books will inevitably trickle into mine. I can’t help it. I don’t read Thomas Malory, for instance, because it will tempt me to say things like “Now turn we unto Helki…” It just happens, “if you take my meaning” (as Sam Gamgee, the hobbit, likes to say). I can’t stop it, so I have to find a way to use it.

Reading Tolkien as I write my book–or Eiji Yoshikawa, for another: they’re more like each other than you’d think–helps me to have a clearer vision of the scenes I’m trying to write. He reminds me to add details like trees, animals, weather, you name it, that will help me to make the scene come alive for my readers. And one of the great things about Tolkien’s style is, he never loads the reader down with too much detail–which leaves ample scope to the reader’s own imagination. I admire that, and strive to do the same.

This is what seeps into my own writing, done in my own way. And a bit of seasoning always comes in by way of other favorite books. Welsh folklore from The Mabinogion, for instance, plays its part in spicing up my writing. And in juggling the various subplots that go into any novel, who could guide me better than Edgar Rice Burroughs–or Charles Dickens? Sir Walter Scott also springs to mind.

So what I have going for me here is a whole platoon of writers whose work shows me, reminds me, and tutors me in what good writing ought to be. They are my backup, my supply line, my companions on the journey. I couldn’t do without them–

And I’m not about to try.