I have no hands!

Or at least it feels that way. My keyboard has died and I'm typing this with the on-screen keyboard, which is slow and rubbish. Must get new one. This will not do...

...and a tardy slip for you, Mr. McFly. Four in a row.

Sorry, this blog entry is a day late. I got distracted by all the nothing I was doing this weekend, and forgot to write it. My bad.

So, Murder, Malice & Teeth (or MMT as I will refer to it from now on) is done and done. There were some last minute changes that I had to make, and there were several setbacks along the way, but done is done and I can now sit back and keep my fingers crossed for some good news.

These blog entries have been useful. They basically kept me going just so I'd have something to report each week, so terrified was I of lagging behind and having nothing to report. It wasn't exactly to the schedule I planned - I hoped to have it done by the end of March - but three weeks late isn't bad for a self-imposed deadline. The important thing is that I got it done, and the blog entries helped a lot. Even if they were of interest to nobody else, they at least partially served their purpose.

I think I might do something similar with future works, because if they can provide anything like as much of a kick up the arse for every project, my output will increase tenfold. Which would be nice.

So seeing as my current project is done, I'm taking this week off from all things writerly to catch up on my TV and my gaming. I've got a stack of DVDs and a brand new membership of Netflix to put to good use, and I've redoubled my efforts to fire up some of my lonely, neglected consoles to get through some of my back catalogue of games. First stop is Bayonetta, which I understand is a bit like Devil May Cry, only even more bonkers and pervy.

Which sounds like a fantastic place to spend my evenings before starting preparations to write a children's novel. It's called "Empty" and it's not going to be very nice.

While that's going on, I have a few other things to consider. I've not given up on my collaboration with Jack Tempest that was originally written for Clint, so you may see more of that in the coming months. Plus there are the Bristol and Kapow shows next month, and I'm attending both. Don't forget on Sunday 20th May I'll be on the Independent Comics Panel with a few others of the Bayou Arcana crew, which should have a blog entry in it at the very least. My first appearance at a comics show as a guest and not a punter. Result.

It Is Done.

What the title says. Murder, Malice & Teeth is finished.

I'll give it a proper write-up on Sunday. Right now I'm off for a drink to congratulate myself. Feeling a bit exhausted mentally and need to go numb my thinking parts so they don't hurt no more.

Murder, Malice and Teeth

Work continues. I now have only one or two things left to do and the script is done. Unfortunately one of those things is to go through the panel descriptions and rewrite them so they actually make sense. On the last rewrite I noticed that some of them don't even make sense to me, and I wrote the damn thing.

That's the task for this week, and barring a few additional things like character profiles and that, it'll be done.

Figured it was time to unveil the title, too - as the subject of this post says, it's now known as "Murder, Malice and Teeth." It sums up the events of the story nicely, I think.

Whoops.

Had to dive back into draft 3 tonight to perform some emergency surgery on the basic plot. I realised with a start in the middle of the night that my rewrite yesterday had created an enormous plot hole. It meant that the main character had no motivation to do what he did, as he was actually doing pretty alright for himself. Kind of hard to have a roaring rampage of revenge that means anything if there's no reason for the character to feel hard done by.

It's corrected now. I just had to revise the back story and relevant dialogue to make the character a hopeless loser again. All sorted. Phew!

Well, that didn't take long.

Draft 3 sorted - that was a much shorter process than I expected, and just a few little turns and changes to dialogue and individual panels have made all the difference. It's brought some themes out to much greater emphasis, while keeping the shape of the script intact.

It's also given me a potential title! Nothing definite yet, so I'm not quite ready for the reveal. I'll save it for when the script is properly done, which is a way off as I've still got a pretty big job in the form of the final rewrite. I realised when going through it this time that a lot of the panel descriptions need work. The information is all there, but a lot of it is clumsy and cumbersome. It's also riddled with spelling and grammatical errors, so that'll keep me busy for the rest of the week.

Fingers crossed it'll be done and done by Sunday!

But enough for today. I've been so wrapped up in the script tonight that I've only just realised I've completely forgotten to have any dinner. Oops.

Second Pass

I did a little tinkering on the script over the weekend when I wasn't lolling around gasping for breath or nursing my aching head. Not a huge amount, as I'm still a bit poorly, but progress of a sort was made. Draft 3 is about a quarter done. Still on schedule to have it done and ready for the final draft next week.

I'm astonished at how well it's starting to come together. When I rewrote a good deal of the opening narration, I stuck to the "every scene must be multi-purpose" system I've spoken of before. In the new draft, by page three you have a good deal of relevant character info on both hero and villain, the hero's motives are alluded to, the past of the characters leading up to that point are touched upon and two of the central themes are raised for the first time. I'm quite pleased that it manages to work as well as it does with all that information included. It doesn't feel cluttered or busy at all.

I just have to apply that to the rest of the script this week and we're nearly done.

I've also, once again, been searching for a new title. I think I'll leave it as it is for now. Maybe one will come to light when the writing is done, but if not "Broken" will suffice. I refuse to agonise over that more than I have done already.

Another Step Forward

Draft 2 of 'Broken' is complete! The 'Chronological Edit' is now done, and all that remains is to reassemble it into the original order and give the dialogue the once over.

This stage of the process was quite educational. I realised a few of the things I'd been doing were a bit redundant. There was a lot of repetition in there, mostly because I lost track of who had said what and when, so I had a few instances where the characters would go over the same material. It's given me a chance to edit that out and replace it with more pertinent character information and exposition. Now I know nothing occurs out of sequence, and everything that's there needs to be there.

I've used the opportunity to further explore some of the themes that underline the story itself, so that the villain's irritating habit of smugly smiling at the hero is given more emphasis. It makes him seem that much more of a patronising arsehole. I also found room to slip in a few references to the idea of wasting your second chances, which heightens the notion that the hero has become so obsessed with the past sins committed against him that he may well have been squandering other opportunities to turn his life around. I'm not sure if I've made enough of it to make the grade, but it's an interesting notion nonetheless and it currently forms the backbone of the ending and gives him a bit more character growth.

There's a few more things to do once I've rebuilt it into its proper shape. Some of the dialogue is a bit unconvincing - my working class squaddie character has a tendency to become a bit sesquipedalian, which is a bit out of character, and I'd like to slang up his dialogue a bit more. There's less work to do with the other characters, but they could probably use a lick and spit, too.

And there it is - quite a productive week so far. Roll on Draft 3!

Still no new title, though...

A Week of Doing Nothing

Last week was my week off, so there's no progress to report. Rather than slogging my guts out, I sat around eating takeaways, playing video games and watching episodes of The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. It was bliss, and Bruce Campbell is the man.

This week will be back to work, however. Boo.