Palette

Recently, I've been treating myself to a re-watch of Babylon 5. I missed this iconic 1990s Sci Fi series on its first run, and was only introduced to it a decade after it first aired; this is the first time I've watched it since.

One of the things that struck me on this viewing was how much the colours and soundtrack reflect the ambience of the 1990s. Pan flutes and orchestral bell glissandi fill the background; the walls are a mottling of blues, purples and pinks; the technology is built around crystals.

It feels like being 16 again.

The New Age tenor of the 1990s was one that drew me in as a teenager. I remember the scent of incense in the air, whale song and pan flute relaxation music in the background, cheesecloth and stretch velveteen, crystal pendants, blue-purple paintings of fairies touching noses with dolphins under a mystic moon. Sun-drenched days when my friends and I would take the train to Fremantle, eat ice cream from waffle cones in South Terrace Piazza, and lose ourselves in the (often unattainably expensive) mixture of cute, eclectic, romantic, spiritual and mystic wares in The Pickled Fairy, Ark of Joan and Into Camelot. Back then, every shopping centre had its "crystal shop" packed with geodes and prisms, slices of dyed agate, figurines of every mystic tradition from Ireland to Peru and back again, candles and oil burners, books and CDs, and cheap silver jewellery. I bought it, too... I had candles galore, crystals at every window, Tony O'Connor cassettes, glittery posters, cheesecloth outfits. Perhaps mercifully, I don't have any pictures handy to prove it. Have a very 90s fairy figurine instead:

Given to me at Christmas 1992. Her name is Lilia. I
shouldn't really still know that, right?
Photo: CSF

It's easy enough to create a sensory experience when you have the senses to play with, but it's more challenging when all you have is words. In fantasy, it's so easy to fall into the sensory shortcuts that the reader recognises - the pseudo-Europe of cold stone castles and oak trees. The Kingdom of the Sunset Sea is no such place. It's a sun-drenched land of red gravel and eucalyptus, of hot thunderstorms and dust, of cubic plaster houses and domed turrets replete with geometric designs. Every time I edit, I see more places where I can hint at the palette that paints the ten-towered world.

Friday Update 16.1.2014

If you're new, welcome! The blog is a week old, minus a few hours, and I'm happy with it so far, so that's good.

"The Roadkeeper's Daughter" currently stands at 50,411 words. It's been a long, hard week and I haven't written much, but Chapter 5 is about a quarter revised/repaired/rewritten. The word count will drop again when I delete the shadow-chapter from which I'm working, but them's the breaks when editing. Hopefully the next week will be productive and I'll still be ahead even after that's done.

At the moment I've got Planet Earth playing via Netflix. I find David Attenborough's voice and the wonderful soundtracks an excellently soothing background noise, and I need something in the background as I don't write as well in silence. It's playing on my work laptop because the TV chose today to stop working (typically, the day my wife brought her six-year-old son home poorly at lunchtime and really, really needed the TV!). I suspect that until we get it fixed my weeknight background noise will be my wife playing Settlers on the other laptop. Not my favourite soundtrack, but companionable enough!

*

Well, I was going to blether a bit about the editing process, but a surprise trip to the urgent care centre in St Albans courtesy of a screaming child has meant that this blogger window has sat open and abandoned for the best part of three hours. I'm exhausted so I'm going to leave it here, with profound gratitude that it's here in England with the NHS, not my imaginary Kingdom of Lynnar, that I am dealing with a child in pain! Pain and medicine are fraught in any "medieval-style" fantasy, and indeed in the Lynnar Chronicles it is access to healing that is the key motivation for one of the characters...as Tamsen will soon discover.

Welcome!

One Friday night when I had a hundred better things to do, I decided that it was time to create a new blog. Four hours and one small temper tantrum later and here I am, posting on it for the very first time. The layout isn't perfect yet - I'll get a cursive script on that title if it kills me - but it's after midnight and my wife will have a Look to give me if I don't come to bed soon. So here we begin.

My aim on this blog is to post every Friday night (or failing that, every weekend) with a short update of where "The Roadkeeper's Daughter" is at. Additionally, I'll post general writing-related happenings, inspiration, photographic plot bunnies, drabbles and other bits and pieces...basically, what it says on the tin.

So, as of now:

• I am just finishing an editing phase, moving into a fresh-write phase.
• "The Roadkeeper's Daughter" has 49,458 words.
• Chapters 1-4 are perfect.
• Chapters 5-12 need either partial or complete rewrites after having been charged through at an astonishing pace during NaNoWriMo.
• Chapters 13 onwards need writing, although some of them were already written, salvageably so, in the first draft.
• My Writing Chair is still perfection:

Complete with a cat called Ophelia.

Time to go to bed now, but whether you're a real-life friend, a NaNoWriMo writing buddy, or just passing by, I hope you'll drop by and say hello from time to time.

CSF xx