What I'm up to...

Right now, I'm solidifying the outline of book three. Every writer has a system that works for them and not every style works for every person. That being said, I write in terms of anatomy. The outline of the book is the skeletal structure. Imagine constructing a human and forgetting to put bones in one leg... not only would the result be creepy and disgusting, but your person would be off-balance and may very well fall to the ground. It's not all that different with constructing stories. If you're not careful, you can wind up with an imbalanced plot that leaves part of the story as noodly as a boneless limb.

Here's my break-down:
Outline - Skeletal Structure - Holds everything in place.
Manuscript Drafts - Meat and Muscle - Fleshes out the story and brings characters/places/scenes to action.
Editing/Polishing - Skin - Smooths everything over. Cuts the excess, tightens certain areas and beautifies others.

If this sounds like a macabre parallel, it's not my intention. I look at it from an artist's perspective. If you ever really get into figure drawing, it's only a matter of time before someone stuffs your arms full of books and shoves you toward an anatomy class.

As of August 1st, I'll be hitting the meat and muscle phase, and manuscript writing will commence! Very excited.

Flossin'

I'd meant to release this blog yesterday, but I couldn't, because of this:

Despite all the warnings, the tropical storm really wasn't a bad one. It was a cocktail of humidity and fine mist, topped with a single serving of heavy rain. No, the little river beside my house did not sweep me off to Tahiti. It didn't even surge. We lost power when the wind hit, but I live in the jungle, weather knocks out our power a couple times every month. The whole thing only lasted an hour or two.



The real star of the show was the thunder and lightning. It was non-stop for at least an hour, and the purple flashes were bright, even in the daylight. Our floorboards shook from the rumbling, and one whip-crack of lightning that was centered right above us made me jump out of my skin and giggle like a nervous maniac, in that order. Nothing like a rich display of the elements to make you feel tiny, frail and very mortal.
Kat would have been right in her element. ;)

Not terribly far away, this video was taken, and sums up the highlights of the storm (there's a pun in there!):

Elsewhere on the island, a bolt of lightning struck through someone's bathroom, tearing apart pieces of the ceiling. Whew! What a ride! I hope you all had a good start-of-the-week.

All yours,

~A.R. Ivanovich

Book Release Notification List

As many of you know, I used to have a sequel release list here on the site. It worked out so nicely that I've decided to keep the system for future book releases. The notification form now lives on the right-hand side of the Contact page. If you were already on the list and you were notified of Dragoon's initial release, you're still in the system! No additional effort necessary on your part. :)

That about sums it up for now. Adios, peeps! Hope you're enjoying the summer... unless you're in the southern hemisphere. In that case, I hope it's a lovely winter!

All yours,
A.R. Ivanovich