I’ve been in a bit of a reading slump lately, but I finally got around to reading The Dark Lord’s Daughter. I’ll be vague to avoid spoilers, but I really enjoyed it.
The main character was clever and sympathetic, and the worldbuilding was great fun with all the subversions about Dark Lords and Ladies and fantasy in general. The book left a smile on my face.
In perhaps the most obvious observation in the history of writing, I have finished my quest to understand plot by divorcing it from all the other things it gets conflated with and boiling it down to plot is how you get between setup and payoff. A short story may contain only one; a novel will have many, which may be sequenced or braided or delivered in any kind of structure that still results in a satisfying payoff.
Oddly, that actually means I don’t have to really think about the plot anymore because the concept of setup and payoff is one I already understood in basic; just the bigger sized payoff of a whole book eluded me because I thought of it rather differently, like one big thing instead of a bunch of smaller ones put together.
The novelette I attempted to plot deliberately like ten years back was an awful experience because laying out an investigation that worked was really hard. But the short story I did a couple years back that was a heist fic, I literally just wrote it backwards. Last scene, then the scene before that, etc. until I reached the beginning. With a novel, I’m all over the map on it, but it’s largely because there are a lot of different payoffs and setups to do, and I don’t have to do the “one throughline” thing I usually do with shorter work, though I thought I did, which was tripping me up pretty hard.
I am sad. I wanted to put the Frontier Magic series on my kindle wish list and I cannot find it on Kindle any longer! My library had it and I read it (more than once) and wanted to own it for myself. It is no longer with the library or listed on Kindle. What happened?
I’ve fallen off the internet again because my mom’s been in hospital. Writing’s also ground to a halt, unfortunately. I did do really well on the first half of NaNo, though, before I had to drop it; looking forward to Mom getting better so I can get back to that book, as well as for all the other obvious reasons.
I wanted to say a huge thank you to you for writing the Enchanted Forest Chronicles. When my son was younger I read them to him, now he is 7 and reading them himself and is asking if you will please write more. He wants to go on more adventures with Cimorene and company <3.
I’ve been in a bit of a reading slump lately, but I finally got around to reading The Dark Lord’s Daughter. I’ll be vague to avoid spoilers, but I really enjoyed it.
The main character was clever and sympathetic, and the worldbuilding was great fun with all the subversions about Dark Lords and Ladies and fantasy in general. The book left a smile on my face.
I hope we’ll see more books in this world.
Likewise! I gave a copy to my 11-year-old granddaughter for Christmas. 🙂
Merry Third Day of Christmas!
In perhaps the most obvious observation in the history of writing, I have finished my quest to understand plot by divorcing it from all the other things it gets conflated with and boiling it down to plot is how you get between setup and payoff. A short story may contain only one; a novel will have many, which may be sequenced or braided or delivered in any kind of structure that still results in a satisfying payoff.
Oddly, that actually means I don’t have to really think about the plot anymore because the concept of setup and payoff is one I already understood in basic; just the bigger sized payoff of a whole book eluded me because I thought of it rather differently, like one big thing instead of a bunch of smaller ones put together.
The novelette I attempted to plot deliberately like ten years back was an awful experience because laying out an investigation that worked was really hard. But the short story I did a couple years back that was a heist fic, I literally just wrote it backwards. Last scene, then the scene before that, etc. until I reached the beginning. With a novel, I’m all over the map on it, but it’s largely because there are a lot of different payoffs and setups to do, and I don’t have to do the “one throughline” thing I usually do with shorter work, though I thought I did, which was tripping me up pretty hard.
I am sad. I wanted to put the Frontier Magic series on my kindle wish list and I cannot find it on Kindle any longer! My library had it and I read it (more than once) and wanted to own it for myself. It is no longer with the library or listed on Kindle. What happened?
Melanie, thanks for asking. I’m looking into this. I’ll reply to your comment again when I have an answer.
I’ve fallen off the internet again because my mom’s been in hospital. Writing’s also ground to a halt, unfortunately. I did do really well on the first half of NaNo, though, before I had to drop it; looking forward to Mom getting better so I can get back to that book, as well as for all the other obvious reasons.
My new beta reader got back to me last night! I have a ton of work to do now…
But it’s okay! I’m excited to see how the book changes when this revision is done.
I wanted to say a huge thank you to you for writing the Enchanted Forest Chronicles. When my son was younger I read them to him, now he is 7 and reading them himself and is asking if you will please write more. He wants to go on more adventures with Cimorene and company <3.