Beginner’s Interactive Fiction, Part Two: ChoiceScript in Half an Hour
“ChoiceScript” is a tool created by Dan Fabulich, used by the company Choice of Games. I am not associated or affiliated with Choice of Games in any way, but ChoiceScript is my preferred writing tool and I believe it is better suited to long-form stories than any other. It is simple enough for non-coders to use and complex enough to have a great range of clever tricks and features.
STEP ONE: Go to ChoiceOfGames.com, which looks like this (the feature story varies):
Click on “Make Your Own Games” (in the top row of tabs) and the next screen will look like this:
STEP TWO: Download ChoiceScript following their instructions on that page. For me it looks like a folder on my desktop.
STEP THREE: You will also need to have or install a text-only program such as Text. I use a power Mac and the text program I use is called Sublime Text. It is free (although I chose to purchase it after using it for a while).
STEP FOUR: When you download ChoiceScript, it has a small piece of story already set up for you, so you can begin writing by simply replacing their words with your own. To access it, open your ChoiceScript folder, then the “scenes” folder (highlighted in the first image below), then the “startup.txt” file (making sure it opens in your plain-text program). It may just be called “startup”.
Inside, you will see something like this (after scrolling down):
So that you can compare ChoiceScript with Twine, here is the exact scene we started writing in my Twine in Five Minutes entry—as it would appear in a ChoiceScript file. This is what it looks like in ChoiceScript after writing the first paragraph and first set of choices:
Note there are line numbers on the left. They will be extremely useful when you are debugging your story, as the automatic testers tell you what line your mistakes are on.
And this is what it looks like after we’ve added another choice INSIDE the second choice (the same choice we did in the Twine story). Readers only see the second pair of choices if they took the second path.
That’s as far as we got with our Twine story.
As you can see, indents are extremely important in ChoiceScript. So are the symbols “*” and “#”.
Note that the word “choice” is always written in lower case. This is true for all the commands that you will use in ChoiceScript.
Tip: Programs need precision. Commands must always be in the exact same form (no capital letters, ever, and usually no spaces). A tab or space in the wrong place can break your game.
This section of story won’t actually work yet. You need to tell the program where to go after a choice is made. Your options are to go somewhere else in the file (you can even go back to the start if you really really want) or to another file. In ChoiceScript, you have a new file for each chapter. You can even have entire scenes that are only read if certain choices are made. Usually, you end a chapter with “*finish”, and the story automatically goes to the next chapter.
So here’s the same story but with all the loose ends tied up. One choice leads to a unique scene. The other choice will go to the next chapter.
From here, you can test the story if you like. Click on “index.txt” (or “index”) from your original ChoiceScript folder and it will open up your story.
You may have to select the ChoiceScriot folder to run it. The story looks like this for the player:
STEP FIVE: Now might be a good time for a break.
Okay? Okay!
Go to the very first line of your “startup” file and you should see three commands, each marked by an asterisk.
*title
*author
*scene_list
Write in your title and your name, with normal capitalisation, like this:
*title Pirates!
*author Felicity Banks
Your scene list is the list of… well, scenes. You can easily add to it at any time. I tend to use numbers, with some part of the title so they’re different to all my other stories. If I have ‘special’ scenes I’ll give them special names. The scene list tells the program what you want included, and in what order. They have to be lower case, with no spaces, and numbers must be written out in full. The first scene must still be called “startup.txt”. That can never be changed. Here’s an example scene list for a story that has four opening chapters and three final chapters.
STEP SIX:
Now we get to the use of statistics—the mechanism the program uses to keep track of the choices made by the player. THIS is what makes ChoiceScript so useful. Don’t worry—you don’t have to do ANY maths.
In the second set of choices above, both “Get off the ship—NOW!” and “Take a moment to fix a direction while I’m above the waterline.” go directly to the next scene. So, what was the point of that choice?
As writers, we should add some text to the choice to make it more worthwhile. But we can do more than that—we can establish through the text that the player character gains an advantage and/or a disadvantage from this choice.
FIRST we need to invent the stats we want. In startup, after the scene list, we invent our stats and their starting value like this:
*create faster_swim 0
*create punched 0
Writing Tip: You may automatically invent familiar statistics, like Health, or Strength, or Beauty, or Intelligence. But Choice of Games loves unique and interesting stats, like “Disdain” or “Drunkenness” or “Introversion”.
Then, in our choice, we can change the value of those two statistics, like this:
Later (probably in the next chapter but it may not make a difference for several chapters), when we want to show the results of those statistical changes, we do it like this:
The player who chose to look around before jumping overboard gets this text:
The water is shockingly cold and shockingly dark. You get your bearings and face towards that one glimpse you had of land, carefully noting the position of the sun since the ship is not going to remain a convenient marker. It is impossible to see the land, so you’re glad you took that moment to look around before you jumped, even if you can feel your eye swelling shut.
You swim, setting a steady pace since it won’t be a short journey. Your eye is throbbing, so you tell yourself the rhythm is handy.
The sun moves slowly, slowly across the sky, and finally you can actually see land blurring the horizon ahead.
Something brushes against your leg.
The player who didn't look around before jumping overboard gets this text:
The water is shockingly cold and shockingly dark.
You swim, setting a steady pace since it won’t be a short journey.
The sun moves slowly, slowly across the sky, and even when it sets you still can’t see any sign of land. You’ll be spending the night on the open ocean.
Something brushes against your leg.
Note the commands "*goto" and "*label". That pair of commands are extremely useful. Note also the command "*else". If you use an "*if" command, you also need the "*else" command to tell the program "continue here".
These two stats (“faster_swim” and “punched”) are boolean stats, meaning they are merely yes/no. Most stats are much more flexible, which gives your player the ability to build up skills or rapport or even their personality in a series of choices throughout the story.
You create non-boolean stats in the same way; by the “*create” command just under your scene list, and a numerical starting value. Often you have a starting value of zero, but for some statistics you might start with 50 (50%) to indicate a neutral starting position (so you can add OR SUBTRACT from that statistic) or some other value. Here’s an example.
First, you make the statistic.
*create swordfighting 0
Then, you create opportunities for the player to gain that statistic.
Later, you can test them, like this:
You can also vary a test to see if a player is unskilled, slightly skilled (has chosen swordfighting skill at least once), or extremely skilled (has chosen swordfighting skill at least twice), like this:
Note that you cannot use “*if” twice in a row. You need to use “*if” then “*elseif” then “else”.
Let’s imagine that instead of swordfighting, this “skill” was how well the player got on with a character named Agoye. This statistic started at 50%, with Agoye feeling neutral towards the player. Depending on the player choices, Agoye may hate them (due to choices that set the agoye statistic with a – instead of a +), love them, or continue feeling neutral. Here’s how a scene might play out towards the end of the game:
Note the command “*ending” which of course indicates an ending.
Writing Tip: In Choice of Games stories, your player must get about three-quarters of the way through the story before dying. “Bad” endings should also be well-written, so the player who chooses to lose on purpose still has a great story experience.
The brilliant thing about statistics is that seemingly minor choices along the way can slowly build up a statistic so that when tested, the player can win or lose in a dramatic (and earned) fashion. Some choices will branch off into unique scenes, but a lot of them will just have a line or two of unique text and/or a statistic. That means they remain meaningful choices without the writer actually going mad writing 100,000 different scenes in each chapter.
STEP SEVEN:
There is one more kind of stat that is important to Choice of Games, and relatively simple to do in ChoiceScript. This is the set of stats that lets a player choose their name and gender. These are boolean stats that include specific text. They are created in the same place as all the other stats—just below the scene list in the “startup” file.
*create name “”
*create he “he”
*create him “him”
*create his “his”
Here is the choice of name (including giving the player the option to type in literally any name they like), and then how to use it. Even though the name is coded is in lower case, using the exclamation mark means it will be capitalised for the reader.
With pronouns, you usually don’t want them capitalised, so it looks like this:
Note that I’ve used male pronouns as the base code. That’s because they’re more straightforward.
Note also that if you include non-binary pronouns (Choice of Games is very focused on diversity—and it’s a kind thing to do—so I recommend it) the grammar will sometimes not work, so you may have to rephrase some sentences.
Eg. you can say, “I took him to the shops” just fine in the various genders (“I took her to the shops”; “I took them to the shops”) but you can’t get, “That dog is his” to work, because “That dog is their” is incorrect.
The distinctions are subtle, so definitely get a native English speaker to check your work!
It is possible to avoid using pronouns for an entire story (I’ve done it) but it’s not easy and it tends to feel awkward to the reader.
Writing Tip: Speaking of gender, Choice of Games also expects you to have a roughly equal number of male and female characters. They will appreciate characters who are non-binary or otherwise gender diverse, too. And every other kind of diversity (IF it is done well! Harmful stereotypes are not appreciated, and if you’re writing about a minority group you don’t know very well then there will be a lot of stereotypes you don’t even realise you hold). You can get Sensitivity Readers, but it’s harder to get them for interactive fiction than regular fiction, and you can’t rely on Sensitivity Readers to fix everything. Also, if your entire plot is offensive then you can’t fix that.
The type of statistic you used to set the player character’s name can be used for other things too. In my cat breeding game, the player can type in unique names for every single kitten.
Beginner’s Interactive Fiction, Part One: Twine in Five Minutes
Interactive fiction is any story that involves the reader in the story, usually by giving them choices along the way that change the text.
“Twine” is a tool that creates a story map as you write your story. It’s shockingly easy to use (speaking as a person who has major struggles operating her own phone).
STEP ONE: Go to Twinery.org, which looks like this:
If you can, download it as a desktop app. Otherwise, click on “Use it in your browser”. Press skip (or don’t press skip, and go through a quick tutorial that is better than this) and you’ll get to the screen that looks like this (if you are using the desktop app it won’t have the warning):
On the top left, click on “+New”. You can type in a title if you like, or leave it as “Untitled Story”.
Your new story looks like this:
Yay! You are now writing a story in Twine.
STEP TWO: Double click on the box in the middle of the blue space. Then your screen will look like this:
In the white box (aka a bigger version of the little blue box), type the first few sentences of your story.
Writing tip: In interactive fiction, most readers want you to get to a choice as quickly as possible, ideally within 300 words. This applies to every choice!
I am starting with two useful story hooks: An interesting setting, and an interesting problem.
Writing tip: Interactive fiction is usually a game (even when there are no sounds or pictures or animations), so using tropes is a VERY GOOD thing eg. Dirty violent pirates; dangerous nature; femme fatales or mad scientists. Try to think of your story as a game. If you were writing a pirate game, you would definitely want fighting, alcohol, historical weapons, and danger—so make sure those things are present in your story. When I wrote “Scarlet Sails” I started with a list of every pirate trope I could think of: betrayal, rum, ambition, gold, evil mermaids, treasure, sea monster, storms. Then I made a plot that linked them all. That is my most successful story.
STEP THREE: Make at least two choices (you can make as many as you like, but it will get out of control extremely quickly, so I recommend starting with two).
I have chosen:
- Take Redbeard’s sword and challenge his friend to a fight to show how fierce you are.
- Sneak up the other ladder and dive overboard—perhaps you can swim the rest of the way.
In order to tell the computer that I want them to be choices, I type them up like this, with double square brackets at the beginning and end.
[[Take Redbeard’s sword and challenge his friend to a fight to show how fierce you are.]]
[[Sneak up the other ladder and dive overboard—perhaps you can swim the rest of the way.]]
Twine instantly creates two new boxes; one for each choice. You can rearrange the boxes by clicking on them and dragging them around. Here’s the same page after I’ve rearranged them so I can see everything better:
To write the next sections, I double-click on either box and start typing the next bit of the story. Here I’ve written a bit of story and another pair of choices. Because I used [[ and ]] again, Twine has made two more boxes for me.
And the story is up and running!
Let’s stop here and see how it looks for a reader. Click once to highlight the original box (the one with your title or “Untitled Passage”) then go up to the menu and click on “Test from here”. It will automatically open a new window.
The choices are in bright text, and I can click on either of them. I choose the second choice.
If I click on either of these choices I get a blank screen, because I haven’t written them yet.
Note the “back” arrow on the top left of the black screen. If the reader changes their mind about a choice, they can go back.
Aaaand that’s it! That’s how you write a story in Twine! Congratulations! Here’s a kitten picture to celebrate.
BUT if you used your browser, you MUST save after each session, because if you don’t touch your story for seven days it will be deleted.
STEP FOUR: Saving your story.
Close your ‘testing’ browser window so you’re back to your usual blue screen. Click on “Build” in the upper menu, then “Publish to file” on the menu that appears below it.
Your story file will go to your downloads folder, and if you open it, it will look exactly like it does when you test it online (but it will not require an internet connection to open). You can email it to friends to read.
Writing Tip: Did you notice the typo in the very first choice in this story? “chellenge” should be “challenge”. The easiest way to fix it is in the very first box, here, where the choice is written:
It will automatically fix the typo in the title of the next box.
STEP FIVE: When you’re ready to learn more, go back to Twinery.org and pay attention to this section:
There are great articles for beginners on the left.
And, Twine comes in four “flavours”: Chapbook, Harlowe, Snowman, and SugarCube. Once you’re getting better at Twine, you’ll need to pick which one or ones suits you best. Use the “Twine Cookbook” to decide which one you want to try, then use the online guide on the right.
STEP SIX: Time to join the community.
The interactive fiction community is pretty great. It is usually very inclusive (especially of women and LGBTIQA+ people). One of the places people hang out is https://intfiction.org and it is definitely worth signing up and having a look around, then joining in the conversations. (They’re getting a lot of spam at the moment, so it may take a little while to prove you’re human.)
Welcome, and enjoy!
The next lessons will include writing with ChoiceScript (which is better than Twine at book-length stories), the Choice of Games forum (for users of ChoiceScript), and how to keep your many many branches under control.
IF Comp 2024: Quest for the Teacup of Minor Sentimental Value
I forgot to explain last entry that the IF Comp is a big contest for Interactive Fiction stories that runs each year. I enter it often (ever since 2015), and love it. Partly because I usually do reasonably well, and mostly because the community is just SO GOOD. There are loads of people who gladly test games in the lead-up to the contest due date, and even more who help to judge games (and often write great, thorough reviews as well) during the six-week judging period. There’s even a secret section on the forum (which is here) where only authors who have entered that year can post and see posts.
Yes, I have entered this year. You can see and play all the games here.
Whenever I enter, I try to review five games. This one is the second one I’m trying out. Obviously I adore the title! The blurb is great too:
I’m surprised but pleased by the basic visuals and animation. They’re sweet. I don’t think they’re a custom thing; I think Inform or something can do things like that. But I could be wrong. And they’re not something I’ve played before, so they have novelty value for me. If every game had them, they’d be annoying.
I quickly reached the bad ending, which was just fine by me. The game is very merciful and simple, so it’s easy to explore here and there without feeling any pressure.
I laughed out loud at the line, “I keep forgetting there are only two other people in this village.” A perfect joke for the IF Comp, where a significant number of judges are also authors, who scrambled furiously to meet the deadline and probably had to massively cut down their original grand idea along the way.
And laughing even more at, “Sorry I didn’t hear you knock. I was busy alphabetising my potatoes.”
I’ll stop reporting every single line that makes me laugh, because I suspect now there may be a lot of them. (EDIT: There were.)
Pretty sure the maths question is wrong. But maybe I’m missing something.
I reached a REALLY COOL bad ending (and several that were just funny), and eventually reached the good ending.
This is an adorable, funny game that is simple, well executed, and highly enjoyable. Colour me impressed.
The Great Book Sort (Part 2)
Since one of my three followers is in hospital and needs more book recs, here’s…. some more book recs!
Favourites
“Clean Sweep” (and “Sweet in Peace”, “One Fell Sweep”, “Sweep of the Blade”, “Sweep with Me” and I haven’t read “Sweep of the Heart” yet) by Ilona Andrews (aka the Innkeeper series). Now here’s the interesting part: they’re not all THAT well written. They read like many many many mid-level paranormal romance authors (and, to be fair, a million billion times better than MANY error-riddled published books, especially self-published books). The plot is only more important than the inevitable love triangle (good), and the writing is fine and fundamentally flawless but not astonishing. I’ve read other books by the author and they went to the “Nah” pile—perfectly good books, which I might re-read if I run out of favourites. So why is this series a favourite? The heroine is an Innkeeper, with considerable powers… but she’s fundamentally an inter-species diplomat, and most of the books’ tensions come from two or more very different magical species coming into contact in or near her inn. So it’s all about making different cultures feel safe and comfortable and respected… and I LOVE THAT TO BITS.
Side note: The “Temeraire” series by Naomi Novik is absolutely brilliant but I can only re-read the first of the series (it’s all excellently written) because there are so many cases of cultural clashes where people are just awful at understanding each other. It’s too painful to ‘watch’ a second time.
“The City in the Middle of the Night” by Charlie Jane Anders is scifi that takes place on a planet where only a narrow band between the permanent day and permanent night is mild enough for human habitation. According to wikipedia it’s climate fiction, but I don’t see it that way. It is, amazingly (since I’m doing these reviews in alphabetical order by author, which is effectively random), another cross-cultural story.
“The Bear and the Nightingale”, “The Girl in the Tower”, and “The Winter of the Witch” by Katherine Arden (aka the Winternight Trilogy). If you want to know what I mean by “astonishing” writing—as opposed to Ilana Andrew’s “fundamentally flawless” writing—this is it. This is really, really it. The trilogy takes place in Northern Rus’/Russia. You will feel the deadly cold as you read. You will feel the corrosive hatred and unmet hope in the heart of the beautiful priest. You will feel the wild heart of our heroine, and the weight of an entire society that falls, always, on the shoulders of women. CONTENT WARNING: Women are constantly at risk of rape, and are also subject to arranged marriages against their will, which definitely includes spousal rape (the men are also married without always getting a choice over their partner, but they are clearly in a position of muuuuch more power than any woman). I am not against arranged marriage on the whole. There are several examples of happy arranged marriages in the book (and in real life). But there is at least one arranged marriage in this series that is incredibly awful, and a better man would have made different choices (yes, even in that historical setting—although there is room for interpretation on that score). The sexual violence is never explicitly described, and it is never used to break the spirit of a female character or to justify someone’s evil with a rape backstory. There are much more creative ways to break a person. . .
This series is magical, and it is unbelievably harsh, and it is exhilarating and tragic and more.
You, too, will weep for a nightingale.
Since I’ve already talked about the brilliant Naomi Novik AND I’ve talked about magical stories set in medieval Russia, I can’t stop there.
“Spinning Silver” by Naomi Novik. This is so good you guys. So so good. It is just as good as the Winternight Trilogy, and when I describe them they sound similar, thanks to the rich and bone-chilling selling of a magical medieval Russia. They even both have a female heroine who attracts the interest of an immortal man (for better or worse—but usually much much worse). But although rape is still threatened in this book, it is only a very slight possibility that is quickly and relatively easily fended off. In this story, the heroine is Jewish. So there is a whole other complicated and historical layer. And almost everyone in the story becomes a better person, which I love. That reminds me: another thing this book has in common with the Winternight trilogy is a protagonist who is incredibly honorable. Even when someone treats them incredibly badly, they do what is right. Even when they absolutely deserve a break they refuse to leave people to their fate. I love that.
“Uprooted” also by Naomi Novik. Completely different world. You’ve got a medieval-ish valley with a nasty wizard who takes a girl from the village every ten years. It’s always someone a bit extraordinary, so the heroine has grown up knowing that her best friend (who is beautiful, and kind, and clever) will be the girl taken. Except the wizard takes her instead. Content warning: there is an attempted rape (that ends rather badly for the attacker, which amuses me more the more times I read it). Again, it’s brilliantly written, including delving into the complicated feelings of the characters. How would you feel if your mother had long since accepted that you would be taken against your will as a teenager? How would you feel if, after all that, you weren’t chosen after all? And how would you feel if you were the friend of that girl that everyone knew was so, so special (unlike you)? And how would you feel, knowing your best friend would be taken and not being able to do anything to stop it? And how would you feel when you were taken instead?
And that’s only the start. I don’t want to say too much, but this book is amazing.
“A Deadly Education” (and “The Final Graduate” which ends on a major cliffhanger, and “The Golden Enclaves” once it comes out later this year) by Naomi Novik. All of the above brilliance, but absolutely hilarious too. This is a “magical school” story, but the survival rate of this particular educational institution is incredibly low. Our heroine is prophesied to become an evil sorceress. People dislike her instinctively, and she is severely hampered in her magical school by the fact that the school is basically pushing her to destroy the world and everyone in it (because it will automatically feed you the magic you’re best at—which in her case is all the most destructive killer spells). Worse, she just had her life saved by everyone’s favourite hero RIGHT when she had a conveniently impressive monster to kill. It is so funny, and strangely sweet, and exciting, and surprising. Naomi Novik was an impressive author when she wrote “Temeraire”, but she just keeps getting better and I hope she lives forever so I can keep reading her books.
“Sing the Four Quarters” by Tanya Huff. The heroine is a princess who gave up the throne to follow the call of her magical gifts. Then she did the one thing that an abdicated princess must never, never do: she got pregnant. What is worse, the man she slept with is currently in a dungeon accused of treason. He’s mostly a pretty face to her (she has a healthy and open long-term relationship with another woman, which is beautifully realised) but he’s no traitor.
Nah (aka good books that I might re-read someday, but just not really my thing)
“Fifth Quarter”, “No Quarter” and “The Quartered Sea” by Tanya Huff. Interestingly, the first book in the series is “Sing the Four Quarters” and I love it, and it’s right above this entry in my favourites pile. But in Book 2 we get a pair of new characters: siblings, and an incestuous love that continues to play a part in the rest of the series. They’re still really good books, but I strongly dislike both of the sibling characters and don’t want to spend time with them.
“Over the Woodward Wall” by A. Deborah Baker (aka Seanan Macguire, who will show up on the “Favourites” pile soon enough). This is well written (Macguire is a master writer) and pretty good, but aimed at a younger audience. I just found the two child protagonists mildly annoying.
“The Midnight Library” by Matt Haig. The midnight library is a place where you can go between life and death, and play out alternate possibilities. Sort of cool, but I want sentient books and mysteriously well-read monsters in my library setting, not a story about regret and life choices.
Nope
“The Dragon Lady” by Angelique S. Anderson. Magical steampunk, including dragons. Too many adjectives.
“Red Queen” by Victoria Aveyard. I don’t remember much about the book (apparently a bestseller), but there’s a lot of clumsy exposition in the first two pages.
“The Tangled Lands” by Paolo Bacigalupi (who had a book in the “Nah” section of Part 1) and Tobias S. Buckell. Really well written but too dark for me.
Writing Daze
Today is Friday, roughly halfway through school holidays. While I usually have at least an hour or so of work even in holiday weeks, this week I’ve had nothing. Nada. No-one.
This is sort of good, because it means there’s a lot less in my life to cause daily panic. On the other hand, an entire week of sitting looking at my carpet isn’t good for me either.
So I decided to double my writing quote this week – bringing it to forty hours. It’s been dreamy. On Monday I spent eight hours working on ONE CHAPTER. Is there anything more wonderful?
I’ve been craving some novel-editing work for a while, but knew I didn’t have the headspace for it. As a general rule, the longer I take to edit a small amount of work, the better my writing is going.
I’m running low on steam today, but right now I’m in my 36th hour, so the fact that I have any steam at all is remarkable. Today I’ll finish the chapter I’m on and do one more, then stop – probably until next Wednesday. That way, I’ll have built up plenty of enthusiasm just in time for the climax and end of the book. I have a bit of work on Monday and Tuesday, so I’ll work on short stories those days.
Today I also launched “Daylight” – my twitter tale mocking “Twilight” (and all emos*). I bet it’s more popular than “Worse Things Happen at Sea”, because it’s pure, unadulterated humour.
Altogether, a good week. And I’ve saved up a week’s worth of writing quota for when my husband and I visit China next year.
*An emo is basically a person who is proud of being depressed. It’s a recently-developed and HIGHLY unpopular subgroup.
Which person am I?
In the year 2000, I wrote my first book for children (before that it was all young adults). I was advised that children’s writing should be in third person, so I did that (despite the fact that I’m much, much better at first person). That book is now a trilogy – in fact the second book was originally written in first person, then I changed it to third person.
The second book has been giving me trouble for a while. It has some brilliant bits, but just doesn’t seem to work overall. I looked at the first chapter over the weekend (after realising I needed to write several more ‘training’ scenes into the fart book) and hated it.
So I’ve decided to rewrite the second book – in first person (which I now know children are perfectly fine with). This will not only end up a better book (because first person is something I’ve always done well), but it’ll make it a lot fresher for me to work with. I don’t think anything big will change – I’ll be looking at the original as I go along – but hopefully this will fix it. Of course this also means I’ll most likely have to change the (perfectly adequate) first and third books too.
Best not to think about that.
Staplegunning the plot
Ben pointed out that the fart book I wrote contained (a) farting, and (b) romance – which don’t suit the same age group. After questioning several of my students (between 8 and 14 years of age) it was clear that he was right.
My problem wasn’t that the romance didn’t suit the age group (8-12) that I was going for, but that the farts didn’t suit them (my two eight-year olds laugh uproariously at the word “bum” but my 11-year old thinks the book is dumb). So the romance (second-biggest plot) is gone – the girl in question is entirely deleted. I’m left with a much shorter book (which is necessary for the younger age) and a lot of holes that need to be staplegunned together.
It took me several days to deal with having written a “book” that will be about 7000 words (50,000 is a short book). I’m over that concept now, but struggling to get my head around the “new” book. I sit at my computer with the file open, and my body instinctively twists away so I’m not looking at it (then I go and write a blog entry 🙂 ).
Trash
As is obvious from the last entry, I’m one of those people who gets high on early drafts, and somewhat carried away (“This is brilliant! I’ll make millions!”)
The crit group has given me a little more on “Farting my ABCs”. There are extra words and phrases, some grammar issues, and “more depth would be good”. The extra words and phrases are what the long breaks are for – so I can actually SEE them. But these aren’t major flaws – or difficult to fix, given my usual editing process.
At the moment I’m also editing “The Monster Apprentice” – the first book in my kids’ trilogy. I’m so impressed with myself over “Farting my ABCs” that “The Monster Apprentice” feels dull. I’m thinking about throwing away the whole trilogy. But as I type that, I know it’s silly. Not because of the hundreds of hours I’ve spent working on it, but because of the way publishers react to it. Clearly there’s something worth reading in there, I just can’t see it today.
My super-critical friend has read “Farting” and says he’ll probably send me his notes today. How exciting! (I decided I needed to be brought down, and that should work neatly. I also figured two large non-editing gaps should be enough; one after this round and one when it’s at a professional assessor).
Some years ago, I was delighted to find out Douglas Adams was dead. I knew he was brilliant; way more brilliant than me – and it was depressing how much more brilliant he was. But when I discovered he was dead, I realised he couldn’t ever get any better – and I could.
Right now I am reading Cassandra Clare’s “Mortal Intruments” series (the first book is “City of Bones”). She is everything I was to be as a writer – funny, scary, intriguing, intelligent. I love her characters and hate her guts 🙂
Sweet, sweet vanity
On Friday I finished my eleventh book. (I’ve thrown five away, and most of the rest are set in the same fantasy world – Rahana.)
This book is different. This book isn’t about love, heroism, or even imagination or wonder. It’s about farts.
It’s short – I didn’t think my mojo was up to much – barely over 10,000 words (which is quite normal for the 8-12 age range). It’s humour – which made me a little nervous (humour is usually hard to write, especially consistently over a whole book/whole readership), but I’ve sold several humour short stories, so it wasn’t too big a leap.
I’ve tested chapter one on two eight-year olds I tutor (one reluctant reader and one dyslexic). They both found it funny, and chose to continue reading my book over reading other books (which have pictures). That bodes VERY well. I left chapters two and three with the first eight-year old, and left chapters 1-3 with an eleven-year old (a perfectly-good reader). I’m curious to see whether they actually read them. If they do, I’ll be seriously. . . surprised.
However.
I’ve also sent the first three chapters to an online critique group. The four or five people who commented were overwhelmingly positive. I just posted the rest of it, and a sixth person described the whole thing as “Brilliant, with a few minor grammar issues”. My conclusion is that either it’s a great leap forward in my writing (particularly regarding marketability, which is the main thing), or the critique group is rubbish. I’m fairly sure it’s the latter.
But what if this is it? What if I sell it to a major publisher first go? What if it actually sells well?
I’m so puffed up with the crit group’s flattery that I feel like sending it off quickly. That’s dumb. What I should do is:
1. get comments from the crit group for a week or two
2. make those changes
3. give it a “final” go-through
4. leave it for one or two months
5. edit again
6. get my real-life friends to critique it (one of whom once told me – incredibly apologetically – that a book of mine had no good points whatsoever. It was then nearly published by a really big publisher, who clearly has lower standards).
7. re-edit
8. send it to a pro crit agency
9. edit again, and if I have to make big changes I should leave it for another month or two before another “final” edit
10. THEN send it to a publisher.
But for now, visions of mass publication are dancing in my head.
Felicity Banks 