Heavy SPOILERS. Everything after the JUMP.
Newest Book ...
Showing posts with label caesar. Show all posts
Showing posts with label caesar. Show all posts
Thursday, March 19, 2015
Book Five: BSG Theology 2 - The Song
Continuing from yesterday's post on how Book Five fits in with the Lords of Kobol trilogy and the greater universe of the show, this one deals with the last two or three chapters only.
Heavy SPOILERS. Everything after the JUMP.
Heavy SPOILERS. Everything after the JUMP.
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
Book Five: BSG Theology
My SPOILER-heavy dissections of Lords of Kobol - Book Five: Of Gods and Titans continue ...
As the title promises, this is about The One True God, its Messengers and the greater Galactica universe.
Since it is so SPOILER-laden, we'll commence after the JUMP.
As the title promises, this is about The One True God, its Messengers and the greater Galactica universe.
Since it is so SPOILER-laden, we'll commence after the JUMP.
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Book Five: History and Theology
(For the record, the "History and Theology" I'm referring to is "real world" stuff; not BSG universe stuff. That'll come in a later post.)
If you've read Book Five and don't mind having the curtain pulled back a bit and the magic spoiled, read on ...
Everything's VERY SPOILERY so it'll all come after the JUMP.
If you've read Book Five and don't mind having the curtain pulled back a bit and the magic spoiled, read on ...
Everything's VERY SPOILERY so it'll all come after the JUMP.
Tuesday, March 10, 2015
Book Five: Glossary
Most of these will be items from the Tiberian Empire, since a great deal of focus was on that side of the world.
See the full list of terms and titles after the JUMP.
See the full list of terms and titles after the JUMP.
Monday, March 9, 2015
Book Five: Connecting to the Trilogy
Tuesday, March 3, 2015
Thursday, February 5, 2015
Writing, Again: Part XI - Finalized Maps
This will be a short one. I thought you might like to see the final maps that appear in Book Five.
As I stated in an earlier post, since Larsa is very Tiberia-focused, the map moves them to the center. Also, much of the world recognizes Tiberia's names for geographical points of interest (Isinnia, Eridia, Badaria, etc.) instead of the more ancient Attican names that Zeus, et al, employed in the trilogy (Galatia, Scythia, Illyria, etc.).
Like previous maps I've made, the place names come from actual geographic features I found on an ancient Latin map of the Roman Empire as well as variations of ancient cities and lands from all around the world. In the trilogy, I stuck to ancient Greece since Zeus, etc., named everything after Attican sites. This time around, without a unifying influence, it seemed logical to name things based on all kinds of differing backgrounds and histories.
Since much of the action takes place in Isinnia, I knew I'd need a more detailed version so I could squeeze in more names and labels.
That's all for now. More reading and editing to do. More blog posts coming soon, too.
Click to embiggen
As I stated in an earlier post, since Larsa is very Tiberia-focused, the map moves them to the center. Also, much of the world recognizes Tiberia's names for geographical points of interest (Isinnia, Eridia, Badaria, etc.) instead of the more ancient Attican names that Zeus, et al, employed in the trilogy (Galatia, Scythia, Illyria, etc.).
Like previous maps I've made, the place names come from actual geographic features I found on an ancient Latin map of the Roman Empire as well as variations of ancient cities and lands from all around the world. In the trilogy, I stuck to ancient Greece since Zeus, etc., named everything after Attican sites. This time around, without a unifying influence, it seemed logical to name things based on all kinds of differing backgrounds and histories.
Click to embiggen
Since much of the action takes place in Isinnia, I knew I'd need a more detailed version so I could squeeze in more names and labels.
That's all for now. More reading and editing to do. More blog posts coming soon, too.
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
Writing, Again: Part X - Prequel Problems
I've typed on this subject before, but as I'm nearer the book's release, it seemed fitting to tackle it again.
There's an inherent problem with prequels. If characters carry over from the original to the prequel, then we already know how they turn out. So we have to make things interesting. We have to do stuff with them that defies (some measure of) expectations.
Zeus and crew feature prominently in Book Five, of course. But the Zeus we see is not the same Zeus we find in the trilogy. There is a learning curve for him. We get hints of the god who will rule Kobol, but he doesn't fully come into his own within these pages.
The same can be said for other characters that appear in the trilogy, but I won't go into further detail for fear of ruining any potential surprises.
Another problem? Characters you don't know about and aren't familiar with at all. Sometimes this isn't a problem and sometimes it is.
Typically, that's a result of poor writing. If A) the new character isn't intriguing and B) the older, beloved characters appear to be shunted aside in favor of the new characters, then you get audience displeasure.
By necessity, there are new characters in Book Five. The subtitle alone tells you that the Titans are involved. Also, as depicted in a Book Three flashback, we know that there's a Caesar, too. I found Caesar to be a compelling character and I didn't mind dedicating plenty of space to him. I don't believe the readers will mind, either.
Despite my own enjoyment of Caesar Maxentius IX, I know people are reading this for more Zeus, et al, and Cylons. I felt duty-bound to get to them as soon as possible, so the creation of the Titans comes fairly early on. (And the birth of the Olympians shortly after that.) The bulk of the book is Titans vs. Olympians. That's the whole point, right?
I was about a month into it when I realized I was falling into the prequel trap. I was spending too much time with new characters and, as a consequence, the characters people wanted to spend time with were being shunted further and further back. So I began to trim. I had to be careful, though, as I needed to build the world.
Book One spends a good bit of time building the world of Kobol in the golden age of the Lords' reign. When I first published the book, I probably had too many chapters doing that. In subsequent edits, I removed a few. It's a tighter book and the world doesn't seem to have suffered.
Book Five is much the same. The world is very different, though. It's not a world unified and buoyed by the gods. I spent too long building corners of the world that could have been taken care of more organically as the story progressed. All's well now and the book is shorter for it. (Not much shorter, though. Frak. I'll discuss that at a later time.)
But there's a tiger in our faces. I need to mention it.
Caprica had very large shoes to fill, coming after BSG. Unfortunately, the show seemed to spin its wheels for the first third or so of the season. They got lost in world building and in character building, too. They had a hard time getting the characters to a place where the audience truly wanted to spend time with them. It's a shame, because they began to find purchase and gain ground in the latter part of the series, which, of course, was too late.
How did Caprica fare against the prequel problem? Well, they avoided having any characters from BSG in it (though they did have the family members of some). The entire show was made up of new characters, some of whom clicked better than others. They jumped into it, whole hog. Props for the attempt. If the early going hadn't seemed so slow and had "SyFy" treated it better, I'm sure we'd have a few seasons of a good-to-great prequel to reflect upon.
More posts coming soon ... including maps, mythology, and the problem with Galactica.
There's an inherent problem with prequels. If characters carry over from the original to the prequel, then we already know how they turn out. So we have to make things interesting. We have to do stuff with them that defies (some measure of) expectations.
Trust me, I didn't go so far as this.
Zeus and crew feature prominently in Book Five, of course. But the Zeus we see is not the same Zeus we find in the trilogy. There is a learning curve for him. We get hints of the god who will rule Kobol, but he doesn't fully come into his own within these pages.
The same can be said for other characters that appear in the trilogy, but I won't go into further detail for fear of ruining any potential surprises.
Another problem? Characters you don't know about and aren't familiar with at all. Sometimes this isn't a problem and sometimes it is.
Like this guy. Who cared about him in the Matrix sequels? No one. That's who.
Typically, that's a result of poor writing. If A) the new character isn't intriguing and B) the older, beloved characters appear to be shunted aside in favor of the new characters, then you get audience displeasure.
By necessity, there are new characters in Book Five. The subtitle alone tells you that the Titans are involved. Also, as depicted in a Book Three flashback, we know that there's a Caesar, too. I found Caesar to be a compelling character and I didn't mind dedicating plenty of space to him. I don't believe the readers will mind, either.
Despite my own enjoyment of Caesar Maxentius IX, I know people are reading this for more Zeus, et al, and Cylons. I felt duty-bound to get to them as soon as possible, so the creation of the Titans comes fairly early on. (And the birth of the Olympians shortly after that.) The bulk of the book is Titans vs. Olympians. That's the whole point, right?
I was about a month into it when I realized I was falling into the prequel trap. I was spending too much time with new characters and, as a consequence, the characters people wanted to spend time with were being shunted further and further back. So I began to trim. I had to be careful, though, as I needed to build the world.
Book One spends a good bit of time building the world of Kobol in the golden age of the Lords' reign. When I first published the book, I probably had too many chapters doing that. In subsequent edits, I removed a few. It's a tighter book and the world doesn't seem to have suffered.
Book Five is much the same. The world is very different, though. It's not a world unified and buoyed by the gods. I spent too long building corners of the world that could have been taken care of more organically as the story progressed. All's well now and the book is shorter for it. (Not much shorter, though. Frak. I'll discuss that at a later time.)
But there's a tiger in our faces. I need to mention it.
I liked it. A lot.
Caprica had very large shoes to fill, coming after BSG. Unfortunately, the show seemed to spin its wheels for the first third or so of the season. They got lost in world building and in character building, too. They had a hard time getting the characters to a place where the audience truly wanted to spend time with them. It's a shame, because they began to find purchase and gain ground in the latter part of the series, which, of course, was too late.
How did Caprica fare against the prequel problem? Well, they avoided having any characters from BSG in it (though they did have the family members of some). The entire show was made up of new characters, some of whom clicked better than others. They jumped into it, whole hog. Props for the attempt. If the early going hadn't seemed so slow and had "SyFy" treated it better, I'm sure we'd have a few seasons of a good-to-great prequel to reflect upon.
More posts coming soon ... including maps, mythology, and the problem with Galactica.
Tuesday, January 27, 2015
Writing, Again: Part VIII - Setting the Scene
As I settle down for the reading/editing process, I thought maybe one or two of you might be intrigued to see where the "magic" happens (click to enlarge):
- Map of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol. A portent of things to come.
- Snacks. Dark chocolate M&Ms (brain food!) and water with a squirt of lemon juice.
- Reference books. Classical Myth and Wheelock's Latin.
- Nook. Loaded with the previous four Lords of Kobol books for quick reference.
- Notepad. Loaded with ideas more than a couple of years old.
- Map in progress. Basically a blank map of Larsa; I scribble in city and country names as I write.
- Post-Its. The ones on the left are ideas that occur to me throughout the day and I slap them there so I can remember to incorporate them later. The four or five on the right are lists of names, mostly. All of the Olympians, Titans, in what order did Cronus eat Zeus' siblings ...
- I don't know what to call these. They're things I mess with as I type or think. There's a pasteboard cylinder with a lid that opens and closes. The air resistance is nice. A pair of Lego plates that I connect and disconnect in one hand. One of them developed a crack a few weeks ago. On the day I finished Book Five, it finally broke. I don't know what that means. I used to have an old glowstick that I gnawed on like a cigar but my wife took it away from me.
- Universal remote. I use it to control my Blu-ray player which is always playing Bear McCreary's thirteen hours of Galactica-related music.
- More notes. That drawer is filled with notepads and scraps of paper on which I jotted ideas.
Ta-da.
Enough stalling. Back to work for me.
Monday, January 26, 2015
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Writing, Again: Part VII - Overcoming Stumpings
I'm still here.
For whatever reason, on Book Five, I find that I've written in spurts. Mentally, I have the whole thing planned. On the screen, I outline several chapters (I type the chapter heading, followed by a brief description of what happens). Then I write those chapters. This gets me from one "part" of the book to the next. Once I've written one "part," I find myself stumped. I'm not sure why.
The first stumping was profound and I took quite a break. Subsequent stumpings have been far briefer. I just came off one. It was the wrap-up of one section of the book before a time jump and the big goings-on pre-holocaust. After a few days of nothing, I sat down and banged out the final twenty-plus chapters (in outlines, of course) over the weekend. Now I have the full structure of the book in front of me. I just have to fill in the blanks.
One thing I am worried about, though, is the length. My personal target for Book Five was 120,000 words. That's how long Book Three is. I figure if I can keep it under that, I'll be doing well. I've got 87,000 words so far. I don't think I can keep it under 120,000. Of course, there will be editing later and maybe even some serious pruning, so who knows?
Does the length bother you? Seriously, I want to know. Hopefully, the book is interesting and entertaining enough so you don't notice it, but I'd like to see how many of you would be put off by having a 130K, 140K, or 150K word book to read.
Let me know in the comments.
In the meantime, here's a piece from the book I enjoyed writing. I hope you'll enjoy reading it:
For whatever reason, on Book Five, I find that I've written in spurts. Mentally, I have the whole thing planned. On the screen, I outline several chapters (I type the chapter heading, followed by a brief description of what happens). Then I write those chapters. This gets me from one "part" of the book to the next. Once I've written one "part," I find myself stumped. I'm not sure why.
The first stumping was profound and I took quite a break. Subsequent stumpings have been far briefer. I just came off one. It was the wrap-up of one section of the book before a time jump and the big goings-on pre-holocaust. After a few days of nothing, I sat down and banged out the final twenty-plus chapters (in outlines, of course) over the weekend. Now I have the full structure of the book in front of me. I just have to fill in the blanks.
One thing I am worried about, though, is the length. My personal target for Book Five was 120,000 words. That's how long Book Three is. I figure if I can keep it under that, I'll be doing well. I've got 87,000 words so far. I don't think I can keep it under 120,000. Of course, there will be editing later and maybe even some serious pruning, so who knows?
Does the length bother you? Seriously, I want to know. Hopefully, the book is interesting and entertaining enough so you don't notice it, but I'd like to see how many of you would be put off by having a 130K, 140K, or 150K word book to read.
Let me know in the comments.
In the meantime, here's a piece from the book I enjoyed writing. I hope you'll enjoy reading it:
On the banks of the Tiber River, east of the city, the
commanders of the artillery looked to the trees on the opposite side. The Gargano Forest was an ancient sanctuary,
but it was a tactical detriment today.
"Do it," Magister Sivius said.
Seconds later, after generals spoke into their radios,
explosions rippled behind the tree line.
Flames clung to trunks and reached the leaves. Smoke poured into the sky and the vast crackling
was only overshadowed by the sounds of breaking wood.
The trees glowed and ebbed a sickly orange. The winds were kind and kept the smoke away
from the assembled army. Flames dotted
the forest and kept it alight.
Just before dawn, the first shot was fired. A commander near a large machine gun
emplacement slumped over, dead. The men
ducked and looked around.
"In the forest!" a centurion yelled.
Sivius and his tribunes raised their telescanners and saw blackened and ashen trees, still glowing red. Some were on fire. In that hot forest moved Cyclops.
Sivius and his tribunes raised their telescanners and saw blackened and ashen trees, still glowing red. Some were on fire. In that hot forest moved Cyclops.
Thursday, October 30, 2014
"Lords of Kobol - Book Five" ... the First Five Chapters
I've reached the (planned) halfway point in writing and I decided to celebrate by posting the first five chapters of Book Five: Of Gods and Titans. Click the JUMP to read on.
Thursday, October 23, 2014
Writing, Again: Part VI - Mapping
You know me, I love to make maps.
If I have a world-spanning story, it helps. Because of the politics and cultures involved, Book Five spans the world moreso than any other LoK book I've written.
If you have not yet read the Lords of Kobol trilogy, go do so now. I cannot further discuss anything without spoiling everything.
Click here for the trilogy.
Readers of the trilogy, click on the JUMP for some details of the newest map.
If I have a world-spanning story, it helps. Because of the politics and cultures involved, Book Five spans the world moreso than any other LoK book I've written.
If you have not yet read the Lords of Kobol trilogy, go do so now. I cannot further discuss anything without spoiling everything.
Click here for the trilogy.
Readers of the trilogy, click on the JUMP for some details of the newest map.
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Book Five: Chapter One
Sorry I haven't posted much in a while. I fell into a morass of writer's block. There were a couple of narrative humps for me to leap in my head before I could carry on. I believe I have now.
So, if you've read Lords of Kobol Books I - III, here's a bit of the next book in the series.
SPOILERS: Seriously, don't read this unless you've read the trilogy. You can download it for FREE here.
Chapter One of Book Five: Of Gods and Titans follows the JUMP.
So, if you've read Lords of Kobol Books I - III, here's a bit of the next book in the series.
SPOILERS: Seriously, don't read this unless you've read the trilogy. You can download it for FREE here.
Chapter One of Book Five: Of Gods and Titans follows the JUMP.
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