Faery

Worked on backstory and synopsis of the current book in order to help myself separate the back story I've written form what will appear in the novel itself.

Musings

After spending some time stewing over my innate dislike of my faery story, I finally realized what about it I disliked so much. It's not that my writing or the story is bad, but rather half of what I've written is really backstory. So, I've got about 35,000 down in Carwyn's world, and half of that will be axed. I am perfectly fine with this, though. You'd think I'd be upset, but I really want to write an extremely engaging, action-oriented novel. And I've realized saying that a medieval society is incapable of moving quickly is a big, fat, stinky excuse. Even I have started to say it once or twice.

After reading Poison Study and the follow-up to it, I've realized just how possible it is to write a compact novel. It shouldn't feel strung out, as the beginning of mine currently does.

So, I'm going to fix it.

College Graduation

As of Saturday, May 12, 2007, I have graduated with a bachelor of arts from Webster University.

I can't believe this chapter of my life is over.

All I want to do is read and write.

Final Draft: Thesis

I've turned in the final draft of my thesis. I present to my department on Thursday. This week is also finals week. Let's hope my papers go over as well as my thesis will. Or at least, I think the thesis will go over well.

First Draft: thesis

My thesis's first draft is complete. Nineteen pages long, and it's not nearly long enough. It needs to be closer to 30 pages, but I was pretty tapped out after writing it all week. It also had a lot of reorganizing needed.

The topic of my thesis is a study of medieval Ireland and Catholicism's entrance into the druidic, polytheistic society. The idea presented is that saints were used as a large part of the conversion process in Ireland. Because they are also the figureheads through which monasteries were founded, they also were the influence behind the monastic movement.

The monks used tales about the saints - called hagiography - in their quest to prove the saint's dominance over each other and, more importantly, over the native religion.

Fugue

I finished hard editing Fugue. Whether it stands alone or not is an entirely different matter. Because of the subject matter, it was written in a way that either draws people in or turns them off. Readers have said they love it and were disappointed when it ended. A few fellow writers said it had a jumpy beginning.

I presume editors tend to think in more of terms of a critical writer rather than a reader. I'll be shelving it for a few weeks until after my thesis is finished.