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That splitting the mercenaries off into their own side series actually sounds like a really good idea. You can cut their stuff from book two entirely and instead just have them kind of show up as unknowns from Tom&Co’s point of view. Then publish their adventures in a separate series, their timeline can actually start earlier than Tom’s and run parallel since they will pretty much be unimportant to books one and two, I’m assuming they have a role to play in three since they are being introduced to us now.
well later it seems like he has to make a conscious effort to use the god mana, I wasn’t suggesting that he try and use that for animagery, just that if he is jittery and cooped up in a cave for days after a fight where he almost died it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch for him to want to try and improve his skill with magic.
I would say a little of both, cut out a lot of the parts with them being bored and add some exciting stuff to break up the descriptions of things that people get tired of reading.
I would say that you could cut the roller coaster part and leave the grove part, after the grove part maybe cut some of the cloudship sections, really you only need to introduce it and then have it make the trip, we don’t need to know how bored they are throughout the trip. Probably one of those moments that you can just jump forward in time for that story line.
easy fix, lift can be enchanted so that the rings don’t actually touch the guide cables, this way the cables are there to guide it still and the hoops never actually have a chance to produce friction. I’m not overly familiar with the expansion/contraction properties of mithril, it being a metal that only exists in fantasy so far, so that one is up in the air, but I would assume that whoever went to the trouble of making the lift probably would account for that in the size of the rings and cables.
I agree, I also like the second sentence better, put it in the first ones spot and take the first one out completely.
Hence the reason I started a thread in the finished reading section for people to post ideas that could potentially drastically shift where the book goes. Hopefully we can get some new mind boggling possibilities, I tend to try and avoid shifting too far from what is already there, leaning more towards just refining things a bit.
First off I need to ask if there is anything fairly big early on in book 3s plans that you could put into the end of book two as a draw for people. I don’t really want you to give away all the dirty little secrets before they’re ready, so no spoilers if it can be helped.
My idea is to cut out a lot of the rapid early scene jumps from the book and filling all that newly emptied space with something bigger at the end that you can leave as a cliffhanger to make people want to not wait for book 3. (lets face reality here EVERYONE hates waiting for the next book, its part of the charm involved in reading) A lot of the early scenes though are for characters or groups that don’t make any major plays throughout the entire book and just feel like filler for the most part, you could cut out the guys that aren’t doing much other than posturing up for book three and give them a flashback chapter or just merge the timelines some. Say start book three on fight day or a few days after but have it go at a much more accelerated rate so that it ends where you want it to.
For me it feels like there are 3 important groups to follow for where this book ends, Hilda and the Saints, (possible band name?) Tom & Co., and Lilith and the not-so Saintly Saints. Jenn and Gastrope are building to somewhere important it seems but nothing happens to them that is all that earth shattering, they basically go on a fancy plane ride and eat good food.
If you have something major that can happen to them to cliffhanger that storyline as well as the tom one, that would be a great place to end book 2. Maybe have them be present in that town when Tom brings the shamans back and see either Tom turning into Edwyrd or Rupert changing shapes? Leave off with them trying to help her with the shock that both Tom and Rupert are demons and Damien and Gastrope already knew? I would HATE to have a book end with a ‘continued in book three’ at the start of a war between realms with discord strewn between allies that had just been learning to trust and like each other. Which means of course that it would be a good way to break between books because the people that are into the story by that point would have no choice but to wait and get the next book to see what happens.
So long ramble later, cut the scenes from the factions that aren’t doing much and extend into whats planned for book 3 to possibly get a cliffhanger for more than one storyline. Right now it doesn’t even feel like much of one is there for Tom and he is trying to build a demonic fortress and an army of orcs.
I don’t recall seeing it used anywhere around Tom so that could be an easy quick fix, just have someone explain it to him briefly, one paragraph early on and done.
On a side note though, so far I have only noticed a few wrong word errors which, if the rest of the book is the same, means you are probably going to be your editor’s wet dream.
I sorta feel the same, up to 92.1 now and it feels like a lot of the little scenes could likely be cut. Its kind of interesting to see how the different factions are reacting to what is happening, but it feels a little too busy. I like the Hilda scenes too and as more happens with Jenn and Gastrope those are getting more interesting too, but everyone else seems like almost an information overload.
It might be a little late for it at this point but a possible solution would be to take a card from….well, Card’s deck, and cut out all but one or two viewpoints from each book and instead put the other characters viewpoints into their own books that parallel the storyline. That would allow you to skip around a lot less, get farther with each book, develop the new characters more without squeezing out the existing ones, and still be able to flesh out the story and world the way you want.
Yup Orson Scott Card is the one. Specifically the Shadow Saga, after the Ender series he wrote a followup series that followed what happened with the people Ender left behind after the war. The book I was referring to as a possible example of a way to keep the detail you want without having to bounce around too much is Ender’s Shadow, it is the Ender’s Game story all over again except from the perspective of Bean. So essentially you would write the books in parallel, publish them as separate books, but they would happen simultaneously from different perspectives in the storyline. It could allow you to make things incredibly complex for those of us that want to know absolutely everything that is happening across the multiverse yet still have each book be easy to follow and full of interesting occurrences.
Might even make it easier to write too as you wouldn’t have to release them at the same time, Tom is the primary protagonist so as long as you aren’t finding out what happens to him next from a parallel storyline its all just icing on the cake. It would also let you write for each character/faction as inspiration strikes without having to worry about trying to get it all to fit into a single book that has limited space.
I would venture to guess that it wouldn’t be feeling rushed or as if you are bouncing around too often if it weren’t for the limited space issues.
I had to look it up to make sure I was remembering right lol. 14 books in the main series and two prequels.
That is pretty much the only thing that will make me give up on an author and their series. I have no problem waiting a couple years for the next installment of a series, particularly if it’s a good one, but once it hits 5-6 years between books I just give it up usually. I dislike having to reread an entire 10 book series to try to remember where it was so I can follow the new book.
Yea I hate it when they miss each other like that too when it happens, but like I said, it is a solid plot device and a good epic should have moments that have the readers going “NO! GO BACK THE OTHER WAY!” or something similar. Those moments of despair can make the story stronger. I just don’t feel you should make it the go-to move for a 14 book series, using it once or thrice is fine but if you use it much more than that it gets to the point where you just expect that to happen and it stops being a plot twist and more a glaring lack of coordination between the supposed heroes.
