Trying to work at these things I've decided are the problems of my Epic Fantasy which must be fixed before the whole thing can be cleaned and released. Problems in this case means plot holes or anything else I think breaks the story, not merely the bits that are badly written.

The first one was easy, needing only the swapping of two scenes' order, plus some slight text tweaking there for and action described twice that only needs once. Haven't done that yet, haven't decided how I want that done, and the current problem is likely to decide that one for me in its resolution.

The second was just about as easy. Only needed to edit one sentence and add another several scenes previous. Had been expecting something more complicated but when I went to add what else I thought was needed it suddenly seemed an excess within the text that would diminish the story rather than improve. So that was left out and I finished unexpectedly quick.

The third problem is so far being the messiest. These are all in Part 2 of the story so far, nice and contained. There are five sections in Part 2, chapters I suppose they'd be (which is an idea, might try an official structuring into chapters and parts). The first problem was in section 3, the second problem was in section 2 and the third problem sits back in section 3 again.

What we have going on here is a lot of unexpected running around, and then the characters solve a problem that had not even been introduced. No hint there's something up until someone demands it be fixed. So I need to find somewhere earlier on to introduce the problem before it gets solved and hopefully make it work with what has already been written.

I think I have found a good spot for that. Just need to extend an especially short scene somewhat, take one of the two consecutive inn scenes and move it about 2,000 words later and one of the lines mentioned as needing editing above has its new nature determined. The other might just stay as it is, which is a pleasant surprise. Also surprising, I thought I was going to have to rewrite the bit that comes after too, but depending how I do this, maybe not. Beginning to suspect I may have to try a fix, take a look at it, see there are still problems with it and try again.

We shall see, we shall see.

I feel disappointed in myself for today, because despite an excellent opportunity with many hours available I became distracted and did not use today for editing.

I am trying to remind myself I have a right to some sense of accomplishment, as I did manage to fix the first item on my checklist of items that need dealing with before I am done with the story. It turned out to be again simpler than I expected, mainly because with yWriter I just had to drag and drop one scene so it was before another, instead of after. There.

It was only a minute's work but it was also something that needed doing and I did it, so a step closer to satisfaction we are. Mainly disappointed I didn't spend more time working on the other problems that are, I think, less immediately serious but also less immediately fixable. But since I want to go to bed feeling good about what I did rather than bad about what I didn't, I'll focus for now on "problem solved" and attend to the others as soon as I may.

[abrupt post beginning because previous topic changes 'enough' here to warrant separation]

Perhaps I will find out if I can reconcile those, since last night (two nights ago, now) when I could not sleep I started work on a new story and slowly realised this could be the cross-genre erotic work I've been saying I'm unable to write.

The idea I started writing with was a woman who becomes possessed by a water spirit or minor deity - I expect the distinction will be unclear in the story too. As I thought about this woman, Meredith, she turned out to be a detective, a private detective even, and I started wondering if I could make a proper mystery story of it too. It seemed suddenly very doable.

What I started writing opened with Meredith and her friends taking a day out on the beach to catch up with each other. For the story[1] I want it to be now I need to extend back from that point. Meredith needs to be established as her own character, her own personality, her own sexuality so she isn't just 'someone who gets possessed by a water spirit'. I need to establish her as a detective and give her a mystery to solve (probably at least one large and one small mystery)) so we'll have that for an 'A' plot and 'Meredith deals with her body and mind being inhabited by a water spirit' as a 'B' plot.

I have been considering having Meredith be a former librarian, since sometimes people with library degrees do branch out into private research and investigation but I need to add something else because I want her in an on-site potential action role too. Inclined to give her a working, non-romantic partner because I think a two person firm might be more interesting, so I need to work out who this person is and what ey does too. I also need to arrange so that this story doesn't step on the toes of the jedi detective series I've been wanting to do (more on that, but not much, if I ever get my next 'real' writing in progress post out of limbo).

There is some appeal to having this water spirit be the only magical thing in the world, mainly because it seems like something a bit different to do, like interstellar science fiction without FTL anything. I doubt I will since there's a lot of fun to be had otherwise (vampires, frex, combine a great deal of criminal mystery potential with a lot of erotic potential, and if I ever have an idea suited for that, this would be the venue for it [this, or a Magic Club story if I ever get around to those]), but I want to make some decisions relatively early. If magical things exist openly instead of secretly or not at all then I probably want one of Meredith's friends to be a professional magician and have it non-obvious that this isn't stage magic until after her encounter with the spirit (whose name is Maris, and I don't know why I've been dancing around that until now).

Since this story has been pulling some strong appeal for me to weave a few stories together into a Unified Erotic Setting I am definitely leaning toward other magical things existing but being largely rare. Easy to put some broad strokes on. Soft science fantasy setting; Meredith was never living on our Earth, but always at least a fictionalised version with fictional locations, easy enough to make that a nice colony world but there's no Earth at the bottom anyway. Travel to strange new worlds, make contact with local spirits and gods, negotiate terms of interaction or settlement. Potentially Winter Gift and the unwritten Emerald Green take place in this setting's past. Don't know setting's position on non-human people who aren't creatures of magic (i.e. faeries, spirits or deities like our Maris), probably depends on what Emerald Green demands. So I'd better do something about that soon.

I need to sort out what sort of investigator Meredith is, and what sort my unnamed jedi detective is, and hopefully arrange for them to have some interesting divergence in style. They both seem to have a similar set of tools (albeit one with The Force and one with maybe super database searching skills) but neither having much in the way of forensics. Trying to come up with a good title got a lot of noirish suggestions from Ami, so maybe a noir or hardboiled sort of style might work well. Or my imagined version of what they are, since I have regrettably not read much in that mode. A personal, strongly emotional style maybe feeds into intense sex scenes which would be a plus, and contrast well with the other series which makes another plus, if I can pull it off and sustain it. Worth a shot.

As for the rest of Meredith, I know she loves climbing, she has a great deal of tactile sensuousness, especially concerning her feet and what she walks on, and she is a switch. Probably, given the foregoing, the sort who would order the person she's topping to flog her in precisely the right way, as a non-exclusive example of something ordinary to her. What about her other enjoyments, she's been a librarian, what does she read? I suspect Meredith enjoys mystery fiction for a lot of the same reason she's a professional investigator: enjoyment of solving puzzles. I wonder if she likes physical puzzles too? I think she has a stable relationship with someone who subs to her, and attends one or two local clubs where she mostly tops and sometimes bottoms. So, need to detail the who and how of her personal relationships early on too. And that gives us something of a 'C' plot now: how Meredith's personal life and relationships cope with the strain of the A and B lines.

Tempted to have Meredith's professional magician friend be the other partner in her firm, but that may push the story in a more magic-heavy direction than I am wanting so far. Consider dropping that friend entirely.

That's about where we are at so far.

[1] Is it a story? There's no plot yet, no end or beginning, just a small cloud of concepts. Eventually a plot will come along. One usually does.

Recently I posted a piece called In Sleep which seems a good illustration of what I have been trying to say about finding erotica incompatible with other genres.

I labelled the story as containing 'unsolicited sex', but were those events to occur in a story of a different genre, or to actually occur, I would have labelled them rape. I think that points neatly to the source of the genre conflict I perceive in myself.

The way I do it erotica is possibly a subgenre itself of speculative fiction. Not because I consistently include magical elements, but because for the stories to work they often posit characters functioning under a different social and moral / ethical framework. The conflict with other genres comes in there, because in erotic stories we have characters acting and reacting in a way that I think wouldn't quite ring true in a different story; they aren't realistic characters (or maybe a better word would be 'convincing'?) for the purposes of differently genred stories and my impression is a lot of genre fiction relies on the characters being believable or at least fitting the expectations of that genre to sell readers on the story.

Oh, but there's an opening. If I can have the characters inhabiting the other conceits of the story and setting believably enough, would that be able to keep them from falling into this erotic uncanny valley I fear? I worry I am being unclear, and that probably means I do not myself understand what I am trying to say. So you get repetition while I sort myself out.

Maybe there is no problem, or none that approaches insurmountable. Why, after all, should there not be stories where characters operate in a relatively bizarre social and metaphysical framework concerning what behaviours are unremarkable, or moral, not-traumatic, while at they explore strange new worlds, or fight crime, or combat an existential threat?

One thing I haven't yet marked is how dependent this is on me, on my head and what's in it and how and what I write. Someone else may write different subjects and styles and have no trouble integrating that with different genres. So at least in part it seems more of a specific issue than the general way I've been talking about it so far.

Okay, I think I found an explanatory approach that has clarity. Not all, but a significant fraction of the erotica I write falls into the category described in fanfic (and presumably other) communities as 'dubious consent'. For the purpose of me talking about it, that means at least one party doesn't consent to sex, or maybe even know it is happening, yet there is no trauma, it isn't treated as rape, and everything works out happily at the end. That isn't how it works in real life, unless maybe you have prior negotiation and safewords. In real life that sort of thing is rape and a pretty effective way of inducing trauma and PTSD in someone (or fantasy of the 'has magic' kind and impossible). I think it is dangerous, and akin to writing stories in which torture is an effective and safe means of obtaining information, because that sort of thing follows and feeds into misconceptions and misinformation surrounding rape and sexual assault, an area that's already confused enough in the public consciousness. That's probably why I often have difficulty reading similar things written by other people, because I need to know it is a fiction game and not something the writer believes, and why I have especial difficulty with it when it isn't of the magic-having fantasy sort.

Normally when I write I try to treat what happens in the story seriously. That's the part that comes into conflict with the dub-con game, and why I'd probably need to treat erotica as a form of SF to cross it with anything else. That, and my fiction tends to be quite asexual otherwise.

[abrupt post split because topic changes 'enough' here to warrant separation]

I let enough time lapse between finishing Part 2 of the story and moving on to refresh Part 3 that it seemed best to start over again. Tedious and a bit annoying, but I couldn't manage the last stretch without fresher context.

The divine pronoun is tricky to keep consistent. Found another couple in Part 1 that I'd mis-capitalised. Pacing and... spread is something else to look at. Originally I started this story with the intent of telling it in a very compact manner but it definitely spread out as the story went on. Don't know if I will be able to re-compress it, or if I should try. Am inclined not to unless something happens to change my mind.

Finally noticed (re-noticed?) potential genealogical plothole. Could address directly or implicitly. Waiting until reading all the way through in case something presents itself meanwhile.

I find I am still enjoying much of the first half of Part 2, which is probably a good sign. Also finding still more missing words, which is a bit embarrassing. Do need to spread the bit about Guy and Udoo further back, before Crangil's story.

Second half, still very tedious and in need of work. Some scenes need splitting, others should probably go entirely. Am hoping there is nothing in Part 3 worse than this. I am looking forward to cleaning it up, but daunted by the prospect. Hopefully what works here can be fitted into a tighter, cleaner story.

A lot of what was written here was written because I was pushing myself to 'just write' each day until I'd made my target, and can definitely do with being trimmed.

There are little things wrong with the narrative voice in later parts which I do not know how to describe - less showing, more telling, too embedded in the perspective of Arryn, maybe - but hopefully will be able to fix.

So far I think the real dramatic climax comes at the end of Part 2. I don't remember writing anything in Part 3 to match that peak. Hm.

And finally finished Part 2. Better get on to Part 3 right away. I dread how bad it may be.

Copy-pasting from OpenOffice.org to yWriter seems to have caused pervasive italics problems at the beginning of Part 3. Annoying.

Pause and slow laughter at that line. That's a good sign, unless my sense of humour is so perversely self-directed as to be useless to anyone else. Unlikely.

That was a weird scene. I suppose I have to decide if there's any value to keeping it. Not bad. Just... weird.

Main problems so far: bad writing and rushed scenes. Annoying, but should be fixable.

Ah, the plot developments of desperate writers. Confusingly written. So far looks like only clean-up is needed, not covering plot holes. Finding myself surprised by this final part of the story. Badly written, yes, but it has potential. There's story I'd not be ashamed of under there, I think.

Finally to the climax. I'm not buying it. This part is being too easy and deflates tension unsatisfactorily. There needs to be something else first, something to bridge the moral disjoint here, something to earn it.

That ended surprisingly well. Relatively speaking. May not have to change as much as I was expecting. That's change as in 'change what happens', not change as in 'change the writing to better writing'. Still plenty of that needed. Realised with the right perspective that plothole I mentioned up top doesn't need to be. Going to consider it 'solved' and leave it in the text for readers for reconcile, since by the end an answer seemed obvious to me.

Week done, next week I'd better start doing actual work on this thing. What are we doing?

1. Reorganise the inn section so it is coherent
2. Clean up the city plot
3. Start the bit with Guy earlier
4. Clean up the writing in general

I am surprised. That seems to be it. Maybe I'm missing something which will turn up when I've got my wrists in there. Exported the files for later reference and comparison, and now it waits on Monday. Excited.