Some updates (Ais)

It's been awhile so I figured I should update the blog, although I don't know how many people actually read this.

The site redesign is still on hold, pending me deciding whether I want to give up my stubborn ways and make things a hell of a lot easier in the short run but not necessarily in the long run... or continue to stall everything with this elusive future in which I will actually get off my ass and figure out how to properly code everything. I'm a cheap bastard who apparently, in some cases, has control issues so I've been trying to go the "I create everything mostly from scratch and design it all myself and know exactly how it works" route rather than the "I can make it fast and pretty and super interactive by using a WYSIWIG but then pay more and be at the mercy of the program creator" route. Dualing options! Who will win?! More at 10.

We've finished the interludes (yay + wtf there were a thousand more than we intended?) and have started into Fade/Book Three. There is the shortest preview ever** available at our forum iffin' you didn't see already, although I suspect you have if you've found this squirreled-away blog since the link to the teaser is très easier to find.

(**Actually, the shortest preview ever would probably have to be simply this: "A". Try to figure out where we're going in the story with THAT, bitches!)

We're currently working on Fade chapter 3. Doesn't sound like we're super far into it, I know. Our schedules are crazy clashing for the most part. But honestly-- I've said this before somewhere I'm sure and I'll say it again-- in this case, I think the delay has been very good. I thought I was ready for writing before and I was, but this extra time off has gotten me even more excited about Fade. I think it has for both of us.

As a result, I'm being more creative in some regards. I had enough time to write a whole bunch of scenes for background story in the interim between the last Interlude and the first chapter of Fade... The majority of those scenes are now defunct because I changed certain aspects but that's really good. It gave me the opportunity to explore a few options and then determine which I liked best. I kind of needed those months to mull over shit that had been on my mind for awhile.

And, what gets me more excited is some things have come up that I wasn't expecting. I created a character I really like now who I hadn't planned to introduce before. But in doing so it helped make some things fit. I know I'm being vague. Trying not to say anything that requires a spoiler alert.

The down side, of course, is that now I'm all raring to write Fade 24/7 and we still have our schedules to contend with, and crazy domestic things like, you know, work. What's up with that, anyway? Anyone want to donate a million dollars to me so I can pay off all my bills and chillax at home and write more stuff and make the site super awesome? You know you do.

No?

Well. Guess I'll have to start hitting up fancy functions to find my sugar momma after all.

A few things (Ais)

This entry isn't really of import except to say I'm pleased with where we're going. We've had such clashing schedules for awhile, combined with my own issues which included an increasing dislike of writing the story, that for awhile it seemed like things were headed on a downward spiral. I never planned to quit writing the story but I needed a break so bad that it was making me hate my characters, dread having to write, and overall was adding to the miserable aspect of the entire situation.

The reason I'm pleased is because this hiatus has already allowed me the chance to start to take the break I needed, which is making me head in the direction of wanting to write again. I still have my moments where I don't want to but now they're few and far between as opposed to the constant, immediate reaction of before.

One of the biggest issues was Boyd. I think months ago, I subconsciously was affected by some things, which ended up affecting the way he was written. Not the plot per se, because we had that all figured out already. But for quite a few months, it felt like nothing was right and all attempts to fix what was wrong failed because I didn't know what was wrong, and no one was happy. It was incredibly discouraging and was a major factor in my starting to hate the story.

The problem is, I only ever started writing because I wanted to write what I want to read. So when I started imagining myself as the reader and not liking certain things, and when readers didn't like certain things, and when we were having problems with writing because of scheduling conflicts, etc, it all added up.

I finally got the chance to step back about two months ago, to figure out what it was that made me not want to write Boyd anymore. We were having problems with Boyd and Sin meshing as well. I realized that certain things had gotten skewed and once we talked about it at length, I decided I was going to start writing Boyd the way I wanted to write him again. That shift was probably most prevalent around Pandora and the subsequent interludes.

It's been working better now but FYI, just remember that everything we post online we consider to be a draft or work in progress. When we go back and edit, some things will change to make Boyd more like the way I wanted him to be all along. Because there were a lot of reader reactions that took us (or me at least) by surprise and it took me months to figure out why.

In the end, the negative or unhappy reactions were mostly reflective of my own reaction that I hadn't realized I was feeling yet: something wasn't right. Some of the reader comments helped me figure out what my own issue was with it.

In somewhat related news, feedback makes me smile. I was just reading some of the really nice feedback people gave, including some really nice stuff said recently in Evenfall. I love it when people comment. I love it when people hang around the site and talk on shoutbox or the forum. It makes me happy.

So keep it up, peeps!

Website redesign

FYI, I made a post at my livejournal regarding the website redesign. If anyone has feedback, I'd love to hear it.

http://starlite-gone.livejournal.com/546973.html

It includes picturrres...

I'd really love to hear any feedback at all on the site as it currently is -- is it easy for you to navigate? Is it hard? Are the colors ok on your eyes for reading? etc. I also made a post at the forum about this (http://sonnyais.6.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?p=2542) so basically, let me know any way you'd like -- shoutbox, email, forum, this blog, livejournal...

-Ais <3

Interlude writing: 3.17 - Ais

Sometimes I find the writing process to be interesting for this series, and maybe in general for me. It's funny because, as I've mentioned before, Sonny and I tend to look forward to certain chapters or scenes for a long time but when we get to writing it one or both of us may end up being uninterested. I think it's the anticipation that kills it.

That happened to me with several interludes... even 3.11 and 3.12 (they will be released next weekend and what the hey, I may as well give out the titles as teasers-- Forfeit and Entre Nous). Scenes that I think will be super cool, sometimes I just don't want to write at all.

I used to sort of like writing action scenes and really didn't like writing sex scenes. So this is, I suppose, why I'm feeling a bit perplexed at the moment.

There are action scenes in some of the interludes that I was like, "Auuuugh I don't want to wriiiite," but then the one I'm working on now has a sex scene in it and somehow, this interlude just exploded in length. And the sort of sex in it is... well. I guess you'll see. But it's not something I'm sitting there going, "Wow this is hot" for because that's not the point of it.

At the moment, it's 31 pages according to Word (that's with a space between each paragraph) and I haven't even gotten the most crucial part of the sex scene written. This particular interlude was interesting because it was added somewhat last minute and I still don't know some parts of it. I didn't work on it for a few days, and then I wanted to work on it on my laptop and killed my laptop accidentally before I could (still need to bring it in -_-), so I was able to borrow a friend's mini laptop which I've used on and off.

As a result, a lot of it was written in little snippets that, when pasted into the larger document, contained a whole bunch of blank spaces in between. And one part I'd written was originally the beginning of the sex scene and I decided it worked better at the end, and then THAT was expanded...

And these other scenes I never really intended to write initially squeezed in there and then expanded as well, resulting in some strange insights.

I've worked on this thing all day and I always know when I've pretty much worked on something a whole day without taking many breaks, and when I haven't been typing super slow, that it's going to be a decent length. I guess I just didn't realize it was that long. It may even be pushing 40 pages by the time I finish the sex.

And that's crazy to me.

But I really like how it worked so well to just jump all over the place, writing the parts I was inspired for, then moving them around until they were cohesive.

It's been awhile since I felt so interested in writing a story, maybe because so often the interludes include things I'm trying to be careful about getting in there and having it happen a particular way. But in this one, I was able to explore some things I otherwise wouldn't have been able to.

And I know this is all super vague but I guess it may make more sense once that's released. I was going to say what the title of it is but I realized it would be a pseudo-spoiler if I did because of some of the info I've already mentioned.

Wow, I'm getting tired though. I've been working on this shit for like. idk. 8-10 hours or something.

WTF MATE aka i'm a fucking blond ass scatterbrained motherfucker

I have too much shit I want to do and not a goddamn one of them is getting done.

I want to work on ICoS stuff, including Boyd/Sin story lines and Emilio story lines. I want to start on my new unrelated to Sin/Boyd ICoS miniseries (more like an arc of stories I have ideas about rather than a multi chapter connected plotline like ICoS). I'm currently semi obsessed with Adam and Gordon and all of the ways they can annoy the shit out of each other but I'm too hung up on Emilio and Zachary and their issues to start writing anything new. Wtf.

On top of that, I can't decide if I want to edit chapters of Evenfall in between writing 3.18 like I should be doing or continue to write random Emilio interludes like I've been doing instead. It's like the man has fucking possessed my brain. I start to open Chapter 5 of Evenfall but then cringe at how awkwardly it's written and start writing about tacos and failed missions and mad Emilio drama.

Ok. Whining done.

But for real, my brain is on fucking creative ICoS overdrive (and completely shoving my plan to start on my separate original novel to the side) and I can't seem to get anything done because I'm too scatter brained and RL people keep getting in the way.

BTW, women are fucking trouble. I'm going to swear them all off and go all the way gay. Maybe I'll pick up some way hot dude at the gym like Brian always did in Queer as Folk.

It could happen.


PEACE.

Sonny

Favorite Quotes and Scenes?

This is a departure from the norm... because normally the blog is rambling about stuff. Well, the only rambling I'll really say is that we've been busy with the interludes in between real life. This week's been pretty quiet on the writing front-- but then, I think we deserve the break.

Now, down to business:

We're curious what readers' favorite quotes are. And we're also curious what your favorite scenes are.

This is anywhere in the series -- the books, side/back stories, the interludes...

If you have any opinions/favorite quotes or scenes and are awesome enough to want to take the time to tell us-- do so wherever you're most comfortable. Here, the forum (http://sonnyais.6.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?p=1938 asks the question too), shoutbox, email, review, guestbook... whatever.

(The other reason it's a departure is because this is an Ais post and it's probably about my shortest one ever.)

Evenfall, series names, editing, and oneshots (whew!)

(Ais post.. in case the length didn't give it away whut?)

So, first of all-- we have a tentative title for the first book: Evenfall. Although I'm sure you all know this already since I said it about a bazillion times on the site + forum in random places.

Titles are pretty odd to consider and as for why we went with this, there were a number of reasons. We appreciate all the reader suggestions thrown out there, and it actually helped narrow it down. Some of them seemed like great words with great meanings but they just didn't sound right, and some others led me on a fun synonym craze until I eventually ended up with Evenfall.

There's this whole explanation of the meaning but what it comes down to? Evenfall is the time of day directly after the sunset. I like the image that provokes-- the idea of going into the night, a time of transition. Since a lot of that book is about good/bright things mixed with bad/dark, and it's pretty much a constant state of transition for at least the two main characters, and probably other stuff I forgot-- overall, it has the right idea. It works well in relation to the other series titles: Evenfall, it's just getting dark, Afterimage, like the memory of something vivid, Fade... well. I won't say much about Fade until that book comes out. ;p

And, in that progression all of them fit with the series title -- In the Company of Shadows. Also, it was going to drive me nuts if it wasn't a one-word title to match the other two. Especially with our long as hell series name. (In Ais' world, 5 words is LONG AS HELL!!!111 PS: Ais lives in a dramatic world)

What's interesting is all of this is pretty coincidental and arbitrary, like freaking everything in this series. You'd think we were all bad ass and planned things ahead of time, but no. It was pretty much like this the whole way:

Sonny: We need a name for the story ((when we didn't know it would become a series))
me: Here are some titles of poetry I've written! They're crap!
Sonny: Uhhh... In the Company of Shadows! SEARCH OVER!
me: Uh ok I guess it's okay for now?

me: We need a title for the second book
Sonny: What about Afterimage?
me: GOLD!

Sonny: We need a title for the third book
me: What about Fade?
Sonny: DONE!

me: We need a title for the first book
Sonny: I don't know
me: I don't know
(time passes)
me: Evenfall? It's kind of okay?
Sonny: WE'RE ROLLING WITH IT
me: I guess it's okay for now...


Good God. The title of the fourth book may be interesting XD I think we should name it FLASH. Or SUNRISE. Or DAYBREAK MUTHAFUCKKAAAAAA (<-- that last choice is clearly the best except it's two words so I think we'll have to invent the world DAYFUCKA to get the appropriate idea across while keeping with the time-honored and vry srs naming conventions of this series. *nods sagely*)

(Also by the way, we did actually put thought into why Afterimage, Fade, and Evenfall work for the book plots XD But it was, filtered down, basically my rendition of our Srs Decisions)


So anyway...

Speaking of Evenfall, we're still editing the Bad News Bears chapters. Which are Bad News Bears because they're Bad News Writing and Bad News Plotholes. I'm slowing the process down like whoa because I'm discovering that writing early!Boyd with early!Vivienne is a little more awkward and difficult than I expected.

It's hard to think in terms of Boyd's mindset when the series started. Not So-Hard-I-Can't-Write-It, but This-Boy-Has-No-Emotion-Or-Thoughts. Also, Vivienne is pretty hardcore. I think a lot of people think she hasn't changed much, but she's always in the background. And years have passed. She progresses too, in her own way, but it's nothing that will ever be in the foreground. And she doesn't have as dramatic of changes as others. (*coughsinboydcough*)

And to finish my post filled with random, these oneshots are fun to write and hopefully people will enjoy them. We, once again, started with an idea and then realized some characters would do things we weren't expecting or some things should be expanded. Subsequently, it went from a plan of like, I don't know, 7 oneshots? To now around 27. LOLZ.

Not all of them are FEATURE LENGTH CHAPTERS, though. They'll range from a few pages to large multi-parters, depending on the topic. And that's exactly why we had to do it this way, because if we'd tried to formulate the storyline between Afterimage and Fade into another book, it would've sucked hardcore and we probably would've gotten annoyed with always having to keep everything cohesive like it has to be in a book. And things would've been lost in the translation.

And now once again it's occurred to me that I've written about 1000 pages on 3 topics and it's time for sleeps for Ais. =(