Aminar

I see no reason not to give the dropbox a try for people interested in it. I have a full novel done. Just leaving it as available for somebody from the group to look at is nice, even if they give feedback... A repository of completed works by our group. We can always just swap books. For instance James and I could agree to finish each other's books by the end of the month and then start a topic where we discuss things, or do it through PM's. As soon as I finish up the Iron Druid Chronicles I can start on somebodies book. It just has to be looked at more as a library that might get looked at than a submission schedule.

Sure. It wouldn't be too hard to set up said dropbox as a shared item either. Technically I have a dropbox for this already with a group of friends. My work is the only thing in it right now and I'd be more than willing to share/host the dropbox. That said we will have to PM the password around as I don't want it made public.

How often do these Blade Wielders go mad or suicidal. I would think that anybody who kills lots would eventually have suicidal guilt issues...(Now that could be really fun to explore as far as a cultural deficiency, which you seem to have laid groundwork for.) What stops houses from full on murdering other houses(Ala the beginning of Homeland by R.A. Salvatore.)and taking their now inert blades? Even if they themselves don't pick up the blades to avoid the guilt issues they could easily barter with them and the like.

So we have John the Firstborn and Edna the Firstborn. John has a baby with Georgina the third born. Their Firstborn gets a blade. If John and Edna have a kid would Edna's firstborn get a blade? Otherwise the society would likely not allow John and Edna to have kids right? Or could John use his blade for the firstborn and Edna for the secondborn? I'm assuming only Firstborn children can get Blades. How does that work with childhood deaths and miscarriages? Why is the Emperor 'only' calling for the Firstborn? (This is the gamer in me looking to understand all the rules, Brandon Sanderson style)

It'd be fun, but I never have an outline... That said, even a post-op (IE after the book is done) summary discussion could be fun. I'm in.

War of The Flowers is my all time favorite book. I was dissapointed with Shadowmarch in the beginning. Book 2 felt like nothing was going on. Then Book 3 went into the comparative religions which I liked and Book 4 was essentially all action scenes. I'm really looking forward to The Bobby Dollar Books.

I'd like to submit this coming Sunday. I'm also(due to my long absence) going to resend the stuff I've already submitted in case anybody wants to go through it if that's okay.

Have you played Diablo 2? The very beginning reminded me(in a really really awesome way) of the cut-scenes from d2. You should make the chains something not metallic, a metal god trapped by chains that might be metal threw me from the story for a bit. Wood has some significance in chinese myth, crystal would look seriously awesome, ice could be fun. From there I have some story questions. A: Do you have reasons behind the cultural idiosyncrasies. The Firstborn being the military is odd, especially given the apparent violence of the time period. Some of your later political discussion is a little wonky. It likely needs to be split up a little because it feels rushed. Now, I cannot wait to read what these sword things do. They sound exceptionally awesome.

Awesomes Very well characterized. Obviously well thought out. You put everything down, so your mental vision has to be great. Tiny Cows Issues Too many adjectives. I would look up Jim Butcher's live journal entry on Character Tags(Or Traits or something like that.) I would guess the idea is to characterize him through the complex descriptions, but in a lot of ways you're telling not showing and cramming way more information than I can process. Especially considering, given the massive bulk of information, a lot of it is bound to be useless. I myself often skip by needless description(Like what the excessive dress information in WoT.) This feels the same, but constant... I couldn't read very far into this... It felt like nothing happened. You had a page of internal monologue per second or so of book time. It was uncomfortable and made it hard to get through to the meat of the story. I apologize for the largely negative post... There is a lot you got right, just remember that your readers will fill in the blanks. If I say; Jimbob walked through the dense jungle foliage, you get a really vivid picture. If I say; Jimbob walked through the dense, green and brown, razorsharp, bug filled, jungle foliage; you get a bigger picture but none of the excess is relevant and it's awkward to read.

PDF's are universally easy to manage on most things. Plus they convert well into everything via Caliber. I like to read on my Kindle. PDF's make that possible. That said, I can make anything into anything with relative ease.

I'm back. After several months with no computer, moving to a new city, and two new jobs; I can finally start writing again. I've been having severe trouble getting stories started since I finished my first book. I'm not sure why, but I don't want to start editing yet. Either way, I can start participating again. Hooray.

My CPU(literally that part of my laptop) just died. I won't have a computer for a while so I won't be around. See you all when I get my new computer.

yeah. This is an unedited bit of the first work I put into the story.(Which is my first project. It needs a major overhaul, but I'm waiting on editing-as per Steven Kings advice. I'm hoping most of those problems get better as time goes on.

Again I really liked this. I'm getting the sense this gets darker as time goes on; your world is very grey, but I love what's going on. The hostile plantlife is especially cool. I'm hoping(for accessibility purposes) that you keep the romance plot fairly tame. Taken too far and you pinhole yourself to a small crowd. Not saying cut it, but keep it mostly clean. Admittedly I try to avoid romance plots as a whole, although I'm not sure I can avoid one in this upcoming project. I found the hound thing hard to get my head around... It might have been my roomate playing Skyrim while I read it though.

I wouldn't have time to comment on them, but I'll read them.

Seeing nobody has responded. I had a hard time getting into this. Likely because I haven't read any of the rest. Just want you to know why I haven't posted(and give you a bump so somebody who knows whats going on can post)

Well, here we have Chapter 2 of Primordial Lights. I have some plans for rewriting this chapter. Tell me what you thin of the non-Keth perspectives. I feel they're required to give the story the right feel; to translate the scope of the power flying around at the moment, and to setup multiple stages of involvement. Do they do that?

Is there a rule saying all of our 5000 words have to be from the same document? I really want some feedback on an 800 word book start; specifically I want to know if I'm explaining some heinously complex magic bits well. Would anybody be upset if I added those to my other submission?

I'd like to submit. And I'd love to see some more submissions coming in. Lets get this going.

Her earing is a simple round stud. That makes it as aerodynamic as a BB or shotgun pellet(read, very).

Writing requires a certain level of tension building. The strain Vin threw on herself there had me tense as hell. I was worried about just that, but she willed her way through. Standard Epic Fantasy writing there. Admittedly that's a very meta answer, but as somebody who does a fair bit of writing I understand what he was doing, and feel it's consistent enough. I rarely ask why something works after it did, because frankly the answer is This universes god(the author) felt it was consistent enough.

I figure keeping people interested in this board can only be good for the group, and we all have writing in common on some level. What do you do to write? What do you need? Do you have a ritual? Pat Rothfuss watched an episode of Star Trek The Next Generation before he started writing. Do you do something like that? I don't write for long periods of time. My minimum is 600 words a day and I generally stick close to that so my girlfriend doesn't kill me. While I write I have something caffeinated(usually Mountain Dew or Tea) close by. I throw on music, or something else noisy. I listened to all of writing excuses during my writing time. Most of the music I listen to is either Heavy Metal or Orchestral(usually a nice mix of the two EG: Nightwish, Blind Guardian, Epica, Dimmu Borgir, or something similar. If I get really stuck I hand write out some notes on my tablet. If I get really really stuck, or want a scene to feel just right I plug into my synesthesia. When I hear music I hear colors. After I finish a book it has a color. Mistborn is a dusty orange. Dead Beat from the Dresden Files is Green and Purple. In my own writing every scene has a color I want it to create in my mind, and I will listen to music that matches that color to help with the scene. You can probably see how heavily color oriented I am in my writing. My next book has a very purple feel to it, so I will be listening to a lot of The Birthday Massacre to replicate that feel while writing.(Oddly the world I'm working in started as an attempt to create a world that felt purple, but my whole first book comes in warm colors. It was an attempt to replicate the feel of my favorite book, The War of the Flowers by Tad Williams, which is very purple in my brain.) So like the topic title says, How do you write?

Quick update. I have now finished draft 1 of primordial lights. Finished at 127200 words. I'm psyched to start on book 2. For now the series name is the ultra pretentious "Annals of Illumination

Oddly enough I never had that problem with The Wheel of Time. I read books 2-10 before reading the first. I started the series just after 9 came out. In a way it makes me like the series more because book 1 doesn't flow woth the series as much...

I can get behind that. The thrill protected him from the effects then, but as he got stronger the thrill became less protection... I feel like this is either total bunk, or really important.