We're in the army now

I've got to the war. And my novel has changed already. Just written the longest contiguous bit of prose in it so far, at just shy of 2k words, and the character of it is definitely different. I'm at that horrible point where I know I need to do some things but I want to get to the next bit of action instead. However, in order to make the action make sense I first need to lay the groundwork for it, or the action will make little sense and I know that I won't go and do that any time soon if I skip it.

In other news, William has survived the first, long range, contact with the enemy and now has a small section. I am in danger of using the bit from "Eyes Open" that resides on this blog at some point, but that will have to be changed quite a lot in order to make any sense in the context of William's life. Am I now sounding like an autistic man?  I think that perhaps I am.  I blame William.

It always gets to me that the war as depicted in Hitler: the Rise of Evil and the war I know from other sources, like Lyn MacDonald, John Keegan et al are two different things. Furthermore, the way that the First World War works in Hitler flies in the face of the way it works in the adaptations of All Quiet on the Western Front too, suggesting that the German experience of it was very different to what we see in the former. I get the impression that the people that made Hitler were not really focused on the war. Being a student of it myself, and borrowing from it rather liberally for the setting for William's rise to dictator, I think I may end up over-doing it.

Still, after I have the 50,000 I can edit it later, right?

On the other hand, I am now back on track at 26,900 words at the time of writing. I may do some more tonight, but I'm having a beer and feeling tired, so I'm not banking on it.

Back on the sauce

Better night writing tonight, achieved by cheating and being too dog-tired to do anything connected to the day job. After the day I've had there I would usually just have a night vegetating in front of the telly, so it was nice to have Nano force me to do something more productive.

So, tonight I cheated by skipping past the part where my MC changes to become a little more, well, minimal and went straight to the Aixlenean war, allowing me to put in some tired training camp tropes and some scenes I remember from the 1930s adaptation of All Quiet on the Western Front and Hitler: the Rise of Evil where the company gets shelled arriving at the front - though I didn't quite get that far. I also added a character name that I've had before but found him to be a lot different than the other times I've deployed him.

Anyway, headlines: just shy of 24,000 words and no music tonight.  Much experimentation, if it can be called that, with dialogue driven scenes that have minimal descriptive elements. Not sure of if they work but so going to keep trying.

Ouch

1,466 words, and they were hard.

Day job has drained me.  And I took a night off it.  So there's more to do in the week on the evenings, when I would write.  I needed 5k tonight.  Or more.

Jeremy and William are split up.  Aixlene has had a revolution.  War is coming.  I write in short sentences.

Total is just over 20k.

Evil?

So, tonight, I have found myself writing a kissing scene and a rescue from a burning building with a playlist that rattled between Angel by Massive Attack and Fire by the Crazy World of Arthur Brown.  I have also found myself deciding that my main character is not a person I would particularly like to meet in real life.  I fear he holds up a mirror to humanity that I do not find terribly flattering but, at the same time, I worry that his mirror is more accurate than I would like.

Basically, well, after that conversation I wrote last I began to wonder about him.  I already knew that he was going to rescue his love interest from a burning building and that his own ineptitude in romantic affairs coupled with the near death experience of his paramour would lead them to cheat on him.  I knew that.  I also knew that, in order to make the relationship believeable, there would need to be something physical beyond hands around shoulders and hints in dialogue.  What I was most certainly not prepared for was what happened.

The kissing scene held a predatory passion that I did not know the character possessed and the fire rescue carried the discovery, and the deliberate leaving for dead, of a young girl trapped in a room.  The latter one leaves me with the most qualms.  I don't like it very much, though William was perfectly happy to ignore it afterwards, and even though I wrote it... well, it doesn't feel very much like me.  I think I'm channelling Billy-boy, and it's not an experience I relish!

On a happier note, the plague has passed the household, the children are sleeping better and so I have time to write again.  Hurrah.  3,468 words today and a pizza.  That's worth celebrating.

Playlists, plague and racism

Well, I had to take a day off to see bonfires and then another to keep pace with the day job deluge of drudgery and devilment.  With sickness in the house and multiple vomitings upon my person by other people I was slowly losing the belief that I could carry on.

And tonight has been rather difficult.  There was a long section that relied almost entirely on third person summary, which is not a good way to advance plot, I was so much more into the whole vignette idea to show time passing and also to impart relevant information without 'telling' - one of my worst habits back when I used to write more.

Having an autistic main character has, however, worked wonders.  Now my soulless and technical style is for a reason and helps to characterise William as he slowly develops into the person he becomes by the end of the novel.  This is, unfortunately, going to mean some conversations like the one I wrote this evening - hugely racist with the characters having the discussion not even having the awareness to register the horrors which they bandy about.  Partly I'm glad, the Dandies are supposed to be dangerous and, well, just a little bit seedy but mostly I'm appalled that I could even write it.

William Caston, you are not a terribly nice person you know!

He knows, he's fine with it, being nice is a sign of weakness if it is not used for personal gain.  Everyone is doing it, apparently.

Well, quite.  Thank you William.  And now shut up, the adults are talking.  Oh, I'm back in the swing, but much reduced on daily wordcount: 15,696.

Disappointing

So, here I am four days in and I'm at 13k words, give or take.  I've stolen from a published novel, trope only, but still.  Now my main character, William, is sulking about the scene where I stole the trope because it is stealing and stealing is wrong.

Despite my best efforts, it looks like there will be a war after all.  Which is a shame, I was hoping to establish certain societal systems and William's outlook without having to resort to that.  But if the dictators of Aixlene's Republic want to be stupid and let a revolution happen then I suppose I can't be blamed for that.

Is it wrong I know the national anthem?

And I'm stalling.  I was hoping for a lovely 15k, but I'm stymied.

Here's the scene in question.

       “Oh, little Willy, just a moment, I hear your sister crying,” with some regret Matilda picked herself up from the floor by William’s side and moved to the small crib near the window.  Picking up the bundle she held the child close to her and began rocking gently, shushing and singing beneath her breath with eyes that were firmly fixed on the face of the small baby.

       William, the painting laid forlornly at his feet, watched with a small frown on his serious face.  Father would be home soon and then the whole thing would start again.  His chance to paint had been lost and now the attention would be firmly on the baby.  Father loved the baby more than life itself and he and mother always looked so happy and smiling when they sat together with her.  Perhaps it was because she was a baby or because she was a she, whatever the reason; she made his parents happier than they were with him.

       Pointing back at the paints William grunted to get his mother’s attention.

       “Oh, not now, little Willy, I’m trying to calm your sister.  Can’t you find something to do on your own?”  Eyes only for the baby.

       Another grunt, repeated, and louder with more insistence in the syllable was made, accompanied by a stamp to emphasise the entreaty and the urgency of it.

       This time no response, but Matilda did turn slightly away from him.

       From nowhere he felt the tears come and let them loose, letting out a long undulating wail that changed pitch but remained annoyingly high.  As soon as the first tear had reached his chin, eyes clouded with them and mouth wide open, drool running from the side of his mouth, he flew at his mother with his little fists flailing; a ball of anger and frustration.  It was as if she was purposely misunderstanding him, all he wanted to do was paint and the small baby could be left on her own to cry, he’d heard his father say the same of him.

       “Willy, I ca-  Ow!  William!  No!”  Using her arms ineffectually to try to ward off the blows of her son, Matilda backed away, holding her child closer and protectively.  “Will- Ow!  Stop hitting me!  No!  Stop- Ow!”  Without conscious thought one of her arms snaked out and her hand grabbed the arm of her son tightly, so her fingers turned white.  The other arm went on hitting her, joined now by feet stabbing out, and still the wail continued and the tears fell.  In her arms, the baby was stirring again, having been soothed to sleep by the singing a moment ago.  “William!”  In her own anger she kicked out, once, and instantly regretted her decision.

       The foot caught him squarely in the stomach, winded him, and then the force of it sent him across the room and off his feet.  But his arm was still held fast by Matilda and so as his body moved away the arm was pulled closer.  There was a sickening popping noise and then the grip was lost, the forearm hung limply for a moment and then the boy was slumping down near one of the walls in silence.  Tears still ran down his cheeks, the mouth was still open but the anger had been replaced by shock, betrayal and the eyes were filled with fear.  There was no blood.  His right forearm hung unnaturally at his side as the boy stood and looked at his mother.

       For her part, Matilda simply held a hand to her mouth in shock, her own eyes wide and uncomprehending.  She had kicked her son.  The words were repeating over and over in her head, taking on a mocking and accusatory tone: you kicked your son; you kicked your son; you kicked your son.

       There was no time for anything else as William simply fled from the room and thundered up the stairs, slamming the door to the small room at the end of the hallway with finality.  Matilda tried to listen but could hear nothing, and her baby was awake and making sucking motions, this would soon escalate to crying and she knew that Walter was due home very soon.  Reverting to simple learned response and unable to think straight she sat down and began feeding her child.  She was an awful mother, she knew, and she was going to be punished for this, she just knew it, not even Jesus and all his angels would be able to forgive her the sin she had committed.

       In his room, William was still unable to make a noise.  Making a noise would reveal his location and doing that would open him up to danger.  Mother had kicked him.  There was no telling what she might do to him now, there was nothing that could be done to protect himself as the door locked from the outside and so he would be unable to bar her entry should she choose to make it.  The arm she had pulled hurt, so he looked at it and worked out that the bones of the forearm were not linking to the elbow like they should have done.  He pushed it back and nothing happened but a lot of pain and shooting stars in his vision, so he pushed it harder and felt something giving or clicking.  At any rate there was a lot of stabbing pain, but his arm was working properly again.  It was better to be fully ready for whatever happened next.  His mother provided food and warmth and shelter and comfort and all he wanted to do was paint but she had deliberately caused him pain and suffering: he had seen it in her face and the frown.  Nowhere was safe.

       Looking out of the small window he watched the sky bruise like his stomach and arm, he had stripped off his clothes to look and sat naked, then slowly go dark as the stars came out.  Below he heard father and mother talking in low tones for quite some time, some noises from the baby, then laughter and the smell of cooking.  Laughter.  They would be coming for him.  He pulled his legs up to his chest, ignoring the pain from his arm and stomach, shivered in the cold of the evening and waited.

       So it was that at some time after midnight he was still awake, the trails of tears salty and dry on his cheeks, when the screaming started and did not stop.  At first he was too afraid to move, his mother may hurt him again, but the screaming continued and he heard his father bashing and crashing around downstairs.  The telephone was off the hook and there was a conversation, the screaming continued.  There was the smell of cold and of desperation, and the screaming continued.  His mother was screaming.  William got up from the corner and padded softly to the door, no one had been up to lock it this time and so it was still open, listening.  The screaming continued.  Opening the door, he peered down the hallway to where mother and father slept with the new baby.  The lights were lit here, oil flame guttering as the wick took hold and the smell of burning onions faint on the dusty air, and the screaming continued.  Without really knowing how he got there, William found himself in the room with his mother again and she was holding the baby and screaming.

       “Mama?”  William had learned that she responded more positively to ‘mama’ than ‘muvvah’, as close as he could enunciate ‘mother’, and something in him told him that something needed to be done.  “Mama?”

       The screaming stopped.  “Willy.  Dear little Willy.  She’s dead.  She’s dead.”  The sobbing that followed was quieter, but more wretched than the screaming.  His mother was upset.  His mother was punished.

       William stood quietly for a moment, eyes wide, and then blinked.  Very deliberately he fixed his mother in his gaze and frowned that intense frown.  “Good.”  Justice had been served.  With that, William walked calmly from the room and returned to the corner.

       It was two days before a relative brought food and another day before he was dressed and taken downstairs.  He was only four, they said, he didn’t understand.  But they were wrong.  His mother had threatened him and had meant to take his life – before she did, her baby was taken from her.  She hurt him, she ignored him, she attacked him and she had been punished because that was wrong.  He understood perfectly.

The Love Interest

Third day blues, alas, have hit.  It's taken me two hours to bash out a couple of thousand words, which was a blow as yesterday I was hitting over 4k by the end of a couple of hours.  I've also had to ditch about 840 words in total over the course of three days.  Of course they're still counted and at the end of the novel in very small type so that I don't have to read them.

My favourite ditched line, NSFW due to language, appears after the line-break: