In Search of a Title

A year or two ago, I'd told cassiphone I'd write a post on why I tend to write male protagonists. At least I think it was her. It was so long ago I'm not sure. I put off writing it because, well, when I thought about it, it became complicated.

The simple reason, as I was growing up, I usually found female protags annoying, so why would to write one?

Second reason, when I write it's usually to explore a character in a situation and, well, I'm familiar with female attitudes/approaches/attitudes having put up with them all my life and I want something different when I write :)

The third reason is interesting, and I only noticed it recently. See, most of my stuff is fantasy set in a world based to some degree on some time in the past. That'll be the starting point for my world-building. Now every novel length story I've written like this has a male protag. As of this month, I've written two set in the present and both had a female protag. I also have two set in the future, on other planets. One has a female protag, the other because the nature of the story has male protags. But with both these worlds, there seems to be a genetic problem associated with the Y-chromosome because they both have more more female characters than males among the supporting and minor characters.

So I'm thinking this is a reflection of how I view these cultures. Past settings are usually male-dominated so less opportunities for females characters so I have less. I don't care for the FC who goes out and pretends to be a male. I like my FCs to, at least start off in, roles that appropriate to their society. Then they tend to be more real to me, and therefore more interesting. Whereas in the future, the appropriate roles are broader.

(Having said that, I do have a potential story set in 1830s VDL with a female MC that I'd hoped to do for Nano this year but although I had interesting characters and situation, they wouldn't give me a plot. Until the werewolf turned up last week and brought a plot with him. I can't see me maintaining interest in it for another 11 months though.)

Last summer, two dry periods killed off almost all the container plants in my garden, including the rosemary and natives :( Four plants survived, a thyme that I can't remember what is (either T. vulgaris or officinalis), soapwort and my two "old world" roses.

If I'd made a list of which plants would survive a bad dry spell, soapwort and roses would not have been on it. That encouraged me to buy another one, so this spring I added Madame Hardy, which rewarded me with three flowers and more to come. Not bad for a new container grown rose.

( Three photos )


Not my garden :) That's my mother with her Echium but it was a bit past its peak when I had my camera out there.

I keep thinking I should do some actual posts on Launceston, so I'll start by annotating the panorama from previous post

( Long photo )

1. Old gas works site, now being Developed
2. Big fancy hotel. It was the International when it was built, then Novotel. Don't know what it is now.
3. Walkway along North Esk River. Walkway is this side, buildings are the other.
4. New Centrelink office designed by someone who obviously went to a lot of trouble to make sure it fitted in with the existing buildings, not.
5. Holy Trinity Church
6. Backwater Creek/Bridge Hotel, now back packers and I'm sure it's not in as desperate need of work being done on it as it appears from the street
7. Clock tower on top of former post office. Erected 1906 to celebrate city's centenary
8. Telecom building, tallest in city
9. Boags Brewery
10. West Launceston, on the hill
11. Monds flour mill
12. Cataract Gorge/South Esk River, in the dip between the hills
13. Trevallyn, along the hill
14. Old Sea Port, where North Esk meets Tamar
15. Invermay Rd, which is the main route through the northern suburbs, and becomes George Town Rd, then meets the East Tamar Highway
16. Entrance to Queen Victoria Museum & Art Gallery, Inveresk on site of former railways workshop

Click for larger version :)

Can someone look after Matt for a few days? He's a 24 year old anti-social wretch who can't open his mouth with a string of obscenities coming out. He works as a scavenger (strips out abandoned buildings when the owners aren't paying attention) and gun runner, and likes to drink, consume various illegal substances and sleep around.

He is pissed off that I'm not working on his book, even though I keep saying I'll get to it when I'm done with what I'm doing now. Usually he goes sulk but he's started reciting an ABC (A is for...). Fortunately, he's stuck on E. I'd share what he's got so far, but it's not work safe.

Books in the box of books that we got sick of lugging to the market and home (aka Books No One Wants To Hand Over Money For).

Priestess of the White, by Trudi Canavan
Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey
Dragon Quest, by Anne McCaffrey
The White Dragon, by Anne McCaffrey
Star, by Danille Steel
Beauvallet, by Georgette Heyer
The Man Died, by Wole Soyinka
Her Honor, by William J. Coughlin
The Eye of the World, by Robert Jordan
The Prince and the Pauper, by Mark Twain
Smiley's People, by John Le Carre
Homicide My Own, by Anne Argula
Legacy of Love, by Caroline Harvey
Castle Roogna, by Piers Anthony
On A Pale Horse, by Piers Anthony
Catherine, by Maura Seger
Roget's Thesaurus
The Road to Paradise Island, by Victoria Holt
The Singing Tree, by Brain Parvin
To Mother With Love, by Curtiss Ann Matlock, Carole Halston & Linda Shaw
Rose of the Prophet, by Margaret Wies & Tracy Hickman
Growing for Market
Funk & Wagnells Standard Desk Dictionary, by 2 vols
Storm Warden, by Jenny Wurts
First Knight, novelisation
Gate of Ivory, by Robert Holdstock
A Kiss to Dream On, by Stephanie Mittman

(There are more, mostly kids books, inc. a whole stack of babysitter's club younger sister, and romance, in boxes at my sisters.)

While looking for them, I also found a box of books that people may or may not have been willing to pay money for, but they only got to the market once or twice before we stopped going. Including them on the off chance some might want one.

Lion Of Senet, by Jennifer Fallon
The Moon and the Sun, by Vonda McIntyre
Post Captain, by Desolation Island, by Richard Temple & The Catalans, by Patrick O'Brian
Privileged Strangers, by Hugh Rae
Cause of Death, Patricia Cornwell
A Crown of Swords & Lord of Chaos, by Robert Jordan
Island #79
AustraAlien Absurdities
The Mad Ship, by Robin Hobb

So now I have to find something else to be preoccupied with.

Last graph :)

I added a line for 50K (white was target word count, blue was actual).

I haven't posted my graph lately!

34110 so far.

Had a bad patch today (heading rapidly towards the area of "Delete everything") but I was informed quite definitely that leaving a character just about to be shot was Not Good and I should go back and fix the situation now. Any protests by me that he was fictional, so it didn't well bloody matter were ignored. And then they brought in another 3 characters, one of whom is muttering that she wants to be a regular.

Meanwhile, in my until now well-behave story, the MC has gone off to live in another town entirely. Eh?

Added 5000 words for a total of 21,400.

I would be happier if my "serious" novel wasn't heaving towards the end game on just 14,000 words. Oops.

I have two problems

Problem 1:

How would you try to prove someone is not a ghost?

Problem 2:

"After dark, we should go and visit Jimmy."
I must have looked surprised, because he grinned. "We have to tell Jimmy how we're going to help him escape."
"Jack, we don't know."
He shrugged. "We'll know by then."

I'll have to know too. Um. Help? (He's in chain, in a cell. In them morning he'll be taken on board a ship to the town for trial.) They need a plan tonight that they'll carry out the next day.

5100 for the day, for a total of 12166, which is better than my Day 3 total for 2007.

I have decided trying to beat my totals for 2007 is silly, as Day 4 means 6400 words. Not going to happen.

I will stick to 4000 a day, I think.

Nice graph. 4400 words for the day, makes 7065 today.

One graph! White is where I should be. Blue is where I am. 2020 words for the day.





It still says World Count. I'll fix it tomorrow.

Words: 1528
Black cats that need to be adopted: 0
Cups of tea: 3
Cups of real tea: 2
Chocolate: 20 pieces
Thoughts that this might work after all: 1
Clues about what comes next: 0

Words: 1022
Black cats that need to be adopted: 0
Cups of tea: 2
Cups of real tea: 1
Chocolate: 12 pieces
Times worrying that this story idea wasn't the best to go with: 3
Discussions about other people's novels: 2

Words: 752
Black cats that need to be adopted: 0
Cups of tea: 2
Cups of real tea: 1
Chocolate: 12 pieces
Trips to shop to buy milk, sugar and chocolate: 1
New photos of setting found online: 6
News photos of setting that are actually useful: 0
Software downloaded: 0.1

Words: 596
Black cats that need to be adopted: 0
Cups of tea: 1
Cups of real tea: 0 :(
Chocolate: 0 :(
Characters who just appeared without warning: 2
Virtual neighbours helped: 5
Ribbons earned but not notification: 1
Pairs of jeans no longer worn found while looking for summer ones: 4

Words: 113
Black cats that need to be adopted: 0
Cups of tea: 1
Cups of real tea: 0
Chocolate: 0
Words written only to be told I'm starting in wrong place: 10
Virtual neighbours helped: 2
Web pages about seals read: 7

Words: 0
Black cats that need to be adopted: 0
Cups of tea: 1
Cups of real tea: 0
Chocolate: 0