Gyah.

[shadesong]

The frustrating thing about writing the character and House bios is all the stuff I *can't* say.

These are just little blurbs for the website, to help people keep track. But I can't divulge any more information than the reader ought to have at the beginning of the story... I can't say how this character's past lives have a history of treachery, or that that one is Doomed to Tragedy, or who this one's soulbonded is, or any of that.

Comments

Write two separate bios.

[dslartoo.livejournal.com]

I don't know how much time you have but that's what I do. I write one set of bios, background information, etc. for myself and my own reference, and another set for answers to be used when I am questioned about the project, series, novel, or whatever. That way I can make the background as detailed as I like and refine it until only tantalizing bits are revealed to the general readers. :)

cheers,
Phil

Re: Write two separate bios.

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, I have a 3-inch binder of my notes for *me*. I'm just having trouble distilling my personal 3 pages of info on, say, Jeramie, down to two paragraphs that don't reveal anything I don't want revealed yet.

Re: Write two separate bios.

[yendi]

Then do it in baby steps -- distill it to a one-page spoiler-filled one that you'd write if, say, you wanted to do a who's-who three or four years in. Then distill that into the two paragraphs.

[gallowglass.livejournal.com]

It's not the same thing but I've just more or less decided to rework the ongoing storyline I've been working on for years and cut as much continuity out of it as possible. For a while now, I've been trying to work my way back to a satisfying entry point for new readers but it never seems quite to come together properly and I've been following the last 18 months or so in the ongoing Doctor Who novels series, since they removed 95% of the continuity there and it's an approach that has definite merit.

I'm planning to build all the stuff I've invented over the past decade or so back in over time but as a starting point, the next thing to a blank page seems like a good idea right now. When I'm done with my latest bout of writer's block, of course...

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Actually, my problem is kinda similar! I started writing the stuff that ties into Shayara when I was 12-14. Then, it had a definite beginning. But Everything Has Changed. The characters I'm writing now are the grandchildren of the characters I was focusing on then. I chopped off about 40 years of continuity. So I'm trying to drop the reader into this world and provide all the necessary exposition, when it's very much a story-in-progress.

I typed up a description of the original story and how it evolved for mousegrrl and stronae once. I need to retype and post it.

[gallowglass.livejournal.com]

For me, this story and these characters have evolved naturally from the stories I told myself as a kid, so I can't really say that there has ever been a definite beginning, though I've written stories that are supposed to act as a stepping-on place for people new to the continuity (I'd say universe but the background of the story itself makes that sort of inappropriate ;-) ).

Every few years I rework the basic concepts to freshen them up but it's not a clean break from the past, nor is it a linear progression. The fact that circumstances mean that the protagonists are (or can be) effectively immortal militates against linear progression becoming a problem. Taking the long view (something I'm good at, since I'm an Ancient Historian in what laughingly calls itself real life), everything can become history, even as the main characters remain apparently unchanged, on the outside anyway. Instead, each new development deepens the concept, adding more levels to it beneath the basic idea. It has moved away from the simplistic Good versus Evil concept of my youth, each regeneration (to use a term paying homage to my apparent main influence) altering something to fit my altered view of the world better but the old ideas remain, integrated, to some extent or other with the new.

I get the feeling though, that this process has been going on so long that the concepts of some regenerations are no longer working harmoniously with those of others (which is actually very appropriate given the strong multi-genre influence of Doctor Who (more the post-1991 novels than the 1963-1989 TV series) that I'm finding at the base of my concept. The various Doctors didn't often work harmoniously together either). This is the situation I'm trying to address with this latest idea. I'm going to remove the support structure that I've developed, the people, the places, the organisations, even the organisation for which the series was initially named and I'm even going to remove my key character's own name and give him a soubriquet. The character has become too familiar, possibly to the readers but definitely to me and an element or two of enigma and mystery seem like a good return on temporarily removing old elements, no matter how fond I am of them.

My last story tried to reintroduce the concept without this back-to-basics angle and I enjoyed it, structured as it was, based on 'Men of Good Fortune', my favourite issue of Sandman, a series of interludes within the overall idea of the story and people liked it but while writing it, I saw how convoluted all of those layers of background were becoming, so I made up my mind to get rid of them for the moment and hopefully reintroduce them as time goes on, in a more integrated form. Now all I need is a basic plot to begin with. I've a few names and some images buzzing around in the back of my mind but I need something with which to bind them together. I think that, in the long run, this approach will create better stories than could be written if I hadn't decided on this course. My main character's final scene remains just as I've already written it, however. Whatever happens, my series will have a definite ending point, if not a final end. :-)

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

"I get the feeling though, that this process has been going on so long that the concepts of some regenerations are no longer working harmoniously with those of others..."

My feeling exactly, with my work... the story started popping around in my head. Were you a good writer at 12? Because I wasn't. :) The stuff from back then is not only painfully derivative and poorly-written, but it doesn't mesh with the concepts of the story that I have now at *all*. So I'm doing lots of retcon.

[gallowglass.livejournal.com]

I began with simple Good vs Evil, as a younger mind generally would and there's still a core of that at the base of things but I can see I've twisted and turned the background to distance my characters from anything that simplistic and it's these convolutions which are beginning to lose their coherence, so what I'm aiming for is a return to a level closer to that simplicity but with a more sophisticated (for lack of a better word) treatment.

I don't think I'll quite get back to those stark blacks and whites though, my worldview's a little too complicated for that these days. Still, one 'hero', one companion, innumerable locations, plenty of villains (ambiguous or not) and a slowly (but not too slowly) unfolding detailed backstory into which to tie character development. It seems like a good road to travel. Oh and a fight sequence or two per story so that the members of my audience who expect such things aren't disappointed... ;-)

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Sounds like what I'm doing. Ripped out lots of thed characters, going deeper into the backstory of the remaining characters, etc.

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

My D&D game is like that right now. Tons of great behind the scenes stuff, but I can't share it with the players, because we don't have time to play. So I just sit around and come up with more behind the scenes stuff. I decided to sit down and work on stuff I can share instead. Plot? ha. NPCs? ha. I've got pretty maps. Edumacated characters would have seen pretty maps, so I can make those and share them.