Saturday, June 29, 2013

Not all books are written the same.

The Rule of Vampire story keeps coming and I see no reason to deny it because it's easy.

I seem to have different levels of complexity that I work at.  (More complex not necessarily being better.)

Level One are the books that I write for the pure fun of it, but which I realize very few people will ever read.  I intend these books to be good, I hope people will like them, but I put them out with no expectation.  My cyberpunk Hobbit takeoff, Freedy Filkins: International Jewell Thief, is an example of that.  I put this book online with little fanfare.  It isn't that I don't think the book is good, it's just that it is so unusual that it doesn't fit any known prototype.

Level Two are the books that come easy, and I enjoy writing and telling the story, but which I feel have some substance and are accessible.  Death of an Immortal and Rule of Vampire are examples of that.  Again, I mean these books to be as good as I can make them, but I don't bend myself out of shape.  I find the story and just write it.

Level Three are usually books that I have difficulty with, for some reason.  The plot goes off the rails, the themes seem too complex, I'm not sure if they are easily accessible.  But they have some good ideas, and I'm challenging myself to try to make the ideas work, and so I'm holding back putting them out until I've made that mix of things work.  Nearly Human and Wolflander are examples of that.

Level Four is a book I'm writing for myself, but for which I'm kind of ambitious.  Like, I'll keep working on it until I think it's become something extraordinary, at least to me.  Sometimes a Dragon is that book, so far.  For some reason, I have an image that this book can be really good but needs to be deepened and enriched over time.

Level Five is the fantasy trilogy (The Lore Trilogy) I want to write, of which I've written the first leg, The Reluctant Wizard, but which needs to be fleshed out completely.  Lots of world building required, for which I want to take lots of time.  A long-term project.  (Though the problem with that is I keep putting it off because others things are coming easier.)

Then there are incompleted stories in my files, which I could pick up someday.  Deviltree is an outlier.  An older book that isn't bad, and probably at least should see the light of day, but which I want to precede with stronger books.  

I intend to keep writing the books that come to me as long as they keep coming to me.  When I get bogged down, I'll work on the books that require more work.

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