Wirefish

I just posted my last chapter on both Ashwinder and AO3. The hiatus is now in effect.

I feel like I’ve just announced the end-of-year code freeze. I’m doing the right thing. I know it through & through — but I’m still glum about it. As nerve-wracking as the whole weekly thing had become, there was a rush to it that made it worthwhile.

I met with a writer friend Saturday. We plotted, discussed, commiserated. She’s revising a novel and got a call from buddy Friday night. Her buddy is friends with an editor with the ebook division of Harlequin (now, don’t look like that, it’ll stick). Turns out there’s apparently a shortage of well-written paranormal romance, and vamps and wolves are finally running their course. My friend writes elementals. So…things sound good. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for her.

It was just a reminder of how much I need to wrap Cantata. I won’t rest easy until it’s done. I can’t work on my original stuff until it’s done (I tried, too). It’s a matter of personal pride, on some level.

Anyway. Bonus vids of happiness after the jump.

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The first NaNo I ever attempted I managed to finish. That was back in 2005, and the characters in the story had been in my head for a good 30 years. Writing it down was almost like dictation: it was in my head, just needed to be transcribed. The working title was “Hookahs,” just as a reference point.

I shared the story with a handful of close friends and classmates (I was in a graduate level program for technical writing that I dropped out of). Everyone enjoyed it, even in its scary first draft state. One gal, who’d worked for years in bookstores, had a problem. She couldn’t decide what it was. Romance? Fantasy? Chick lit?

At the time, I sort of dismissed her comments. I’d been taught to write without thinking of the audience. Just write, the audience will find it. And to some extent, I think that’s valid. I mean, here we all are, adults, still wrapped up in what’s apparently a kids’ book.

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I had a long chat with some writer buddies this evening and I’ve been looking over comments y’all have made to me the last couple months.

I’m going to take the collective advice and put posting this thing on hiatus. The serial thing is killing me.

I’m on a stupid schedule now of “post as soon as I have a final version”. It’s unfair to my betas; it’s driving me crazy.

I got useful feedback today, too, a request that I make the chapters longer. I can do that, and it will let me get through things faster. It means some retooling and rethinking my chapter headings. I’ve been trying to adhere to 1500 word chunks. No good reason really, but I was trying to keep the chapters a regular length and had to pick a number. (ENTIRELY coincidental that it’s close to NaNo’s 1667 words. I swear.) If any of you have thoughts on chapter length or naming, sing out.

So for those of you who’ve stepped away mid-story — what are your words of wisdom? Do I preface the next chapter with a giant “Publishing has been suspended”? Do I provide a potential ETA for the hiatus to end? Do I emulate what the BBC did to Dr Who during Colin Baker’s run and make it vague?

I do fully intend to release the rest of it, but now is bad amidst everything else in my life.

I seem to have located another couple of words that divide USAians and the UKians. I speak of the evil “wet” and “got.” Not as in “got wet,” which is something else.

“Wet” in past tense is either “wetted” or “wet”. Really. Both are acceptable. I like past tense words to differ from the infinitive, which to my feeble mind should always be a present tense. Hence:

• To love — I love, I loved, I will love, I have loved, &c.
• To wet — I wet, I wetted, I will wet, &c.

That “I wet” for both present and past tenses — it ain’t right, man. I like the trochee, too. Wet’ed. It appears the preference in scientific usage is “wetted,” as in, “I wetted the slide.” (I see that WordPress’s spell check has a problem with “wetted.”)

In the end, I take issue with irregular verbs. I never liked them in Latin or German, either, so at least I’m consistent.

Now then. “Got.” Past tense of “to get,” which itself is full of fun. Did you obtain? Or did you impregnate? I got you! HAH! Now, I see that the trend is that UKians think “gotten” is the misbegotten phrase of us lost colonials, but historically “gotten” was the preferred form when we got free of the Crown. My personal preference for more syllables rather than fewer, but at least it’s easy to recall. All I have to do is remember Sexy Rexy declaring, “She’s got it!” from My Fair Lady (which I realize is still present tense, but hey — mnemonic). Wait. I do say “I got the milk,” but “I’ve gotten the milk.” Hm.

Language. Go figure. (Bonus on poetic feet after the jump.)

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