I liked that the interlinking of those books was a subtle aspect of the worldbuild, rather than an overt narrative. As I've mentioned sometime in the dim and distant, I read them somewhat out of order, and it wasn't until Low Red Moon (which I read last) that those threads tied for me. It made the world deeper and more disconcerting.
But that was my experience as a reader, and as a writer I know how a thing written can grate on one when the question of why has no sufficient answer.
Learning the craft of writing is occupational by nature. One does not do one's training or apprenticeship and leave it at that. Some writers never master their craft. I think you are a finer writer for all your mistakes than you could have been without making them. It's just a mixed blessing of the trade that they are so often placed in public view, all solid and prone to rearing up and taunting you long after the fact. Not like baking, where you can toss them away and forget about them, and in three years or so you will be a Baker and that's pretty much that.
If you can bear it, let them stand. They are what they are, if that can be enough. Put the effort into new and different, if you try to fix the imperfections of the past you'll get stuck there. Remember what happened to The Stand when King tried to fix it after the fact, not to speak of what happened to King himself. The thing with the imperfect past is that it isn't broken, so attemps to fix it will nigh-invariably fuck up.
I know it's odd sort of advice when our trade is one of obsession and reflection, but don't obsess and reflect too much. Obsess reflectively, perhaps, and don't reflect obsessively. That might not be exactly what I mean. Maybe I'm trying to put something wordless into words again. It's a compulsion, and one I should keep firmly in check before coffee.
Today I woke with a phrase in my mind (no good dreams to springboard the day's work), and it's one that could make readers of Michael Swanwick and Holly Black shudder; Fairy Tantra. I don't know what, if anything will come of it, but it sent my mind down some perilous paths.
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Date: 2011-10-13 02:05 am (UTC)I liked that the interlinking of those books was a subtle aspect of the worldbuild, rather than an overt narrative. As I've mentioned sometime in the dim and distant, I read them somewhat out of order, and it wasn't until Low Red Moon (which I read last) that those threads tied for me. It made the world deeper and more disconcerting.
But that was my experience as a reader, and as a writer I know how a thing written can grate on one when the question of why has no sufficient answer.
Learning the craft of writing is occupational by nature. One does not do one's training or apprenticeship and leave it at that. Some writers never master their craft. I think you are a finer writer for all your mistakes than you could have been without making them. It's just a mixed blessing of the trade that they are so often placed in public view, all solid and prone to rearing up and taunting you long after the fact. Not like baking, where you can toss them away and forget about them, and in three years or so you will be a Baker and that's pretty much that.
If you can bear it, let them stand. They are what they are, if that can be enough. Put the effort into new and different, if you try to fix the imperfections of the past you'll get stuck there. Remember what happened to The Stand when King tried to fix it after the fact, not to speak of what happened to King himself. The thing with the imperfect past is that it isn't broken, so attemps to fix it will nigh-invariably fuck up.
I know it's odd sort of advice when our trade is one of obsession and reflection, but don't obsess and reflect too much. Obsess reflectively, perhaps, and don't reflect obsessively. That might not be exactly what I mean. Maybe I'm trying to put something wordless into words again. It's a compulsion, and one I should keep firmly in check before coffee.
Today I woke with a phrase in my mind (no good dreams to springboard the day's work), and it's one that could make readers of Michael Swanwick and Holly Black shudder; Fairy Tantra. I don't know what, if anything will come of it, but it sent my mind down some perilous paths.