Arrant Nonsense

Yeah, so, Glam!Ben was rejected. A personal rejection, I think the very first personal rejection I've ever gotten from these fine folks. She said she wanted more depth and complexity from the bad guys but loved the humor and the little twist where Ben's not actually the Alpha. (This is not, particularly, a spoiler for my flist. No one who knows Ben would mistake him for an Alpha anything.)

Now, I made my bad guy a shallow Bad Bond Villain totally on purpose. There's even a wink in there to "twirling his mustache." So I get where she's coming from on the whole "more depth." It's a fair criticism, and she's not wrong.

So, I guess the question is, how do I add "more depth" to a character when I'd really like to keep the story under 6000 words (it's knocking on 5900 at this point), and it's not from his POV? And... well... should I?

I've got him monologuing pretty good there. Honestly, I think I could add a couple of lines and give him the depth. If only I knew what those lines should be...

I'll poke the thing, I guess. Because, like I say, the editor was not wrong.

And I like this story. I like it a lot. The Mighty Sarcasm of Ben plays a large role, he gets to be stressed and chop his sentences, I have gun geekery and a tiny bit of Shakespeare, and Janni kicks ass. The Damsel in Distress is Ben, this time, which I haven't actually done in fiction I could sell for awhile, so it's a nice change. He ends up kidnapped and bleeding and nearly dead, but no one hits him in this one (not for lack of trying), and Janni actually has more agency in this one than she did in the story that was ostensibly about her.

This one is more about them, and that may be where the difference lies.

It's not quite 5300 words. So I have 700 words in which to fix the glaring flaws. To wit:

• Needs moar Shakespeare. Sooner.
  
  
• Ben's PTSD, and the scars, should be brought out much earlier. Without an infodump. Ha.
  
  
• Really need a couple more Little Moments between him and Janni. This isn't necessarily easy when they don't share a lot of screentime together except at the start and finish. They adore each other, and I need to make that a lot more obvious.
  
  
• I need to describe Janni. I know what she looks like. Most of you know what she looks like. Readers new to the canon, however (which is, oh, everyone else), do not. A little more on Ben would be good, too, because his copious scars are never even mentioned.
  
  
• I have got to get the word "glampire" in there somewhere. I just do.

So. I have work to do. In between laundry, school, food, and grocery shopping. Whee.

Damn insomnia anyhow.

But. My house is quiet (other than an importunate cat, who has finally come to terms with the fact that she may not sleep on my stomach right now and is instead sleeping by my leg), so I'm getting some work done, because deadlines wait for no writer.

The one I'm working on right now is the 99fiction Flash Contest, with a deadline of March 3. Where my drabble peeps? You know you want to enter that. Clearly, it can't be a fandom drabble, but you can come up with something, right? This will be my third original tinyfic. If it doesn't win, I'll post it up here and also put it on the back of my business cards. If it does win, well. I will celebrate.

Natch, it still needs a title.

And of course, there's the Glam Ben story. I've hit the midpoint or thereabouts, 2500 words in, on track for a first draft by Saturday. I know what the next scene is, so that's next on my agenda.

Oh, and I still have the damn flu, although I think I feel better today than I did yesterday.

I now have a fully-formed Plot for Glam Ben. I have a villain, I have a motive, and I have ways for Janni to be Awesome.

I also need to take Chambliss out of the story. *sob*

I only have 6000 words to play with here. Adding Chambliss, while it would be hilarious and I love him, would also add a need for explanations. Janni is awesome enough on her own that she does not Need Help. So, sorry, Chambliss, you're not in this one. I will write one just for you in my next NaNo round, okay?

I passed Janni's story over to my Writing Buddy and got back crit on Zombunnies. That one is nearly ready for subbing. I'll put the crit (not just his, but also that from the lovely and effulgent texanfan) to use tonight, polish it tomorrow, and then start sending it out.

And then, when Hubby's off on his trip, I'll sit down with Angry Bitter Angel, in one long session, and see how well it holds together. I may will print out all thirty-three pages of it to do so. In a different font. Understand that those thirty-three pages are not Standard Manuscript Format. SMF will probably triple the page count. Won't that be fun.

Were I smart, I would actually start keeping track of things like paper and ink expenditures, and postage, and deduct them from our income taxes. I swear I go through more ink...

Well, the trip to Colorado is off. The HubbyMom is ill, whether from the topical chemo she's applying to the incipient skin cancer on her nose (we live in the future!) or from a bug going around, she's not sure. But that works out for this week, anyway--now I don't have to worry about Boy's Scout Thing or cancelling the meeting with my Writing Buddy.

I've got my first pinch and my midpoint for the Glam Ben story. You know, Larry Correia said "I don't write horror because I don't write victim fiction." And there's a lot to be said for that. I frequently use Ben as either a punching bag or a damsel in distress (which I've hung a lampshade on, more than once), but he also kicks ass and takes names. Eventually.

I'm not sure how I do that in this one. And that's driving me a little crazy. I have a sort of rescue plan in place, but the boy is strapped to a table with a needle in his hand and an aconite drip, experiencing the requisite (for him) flashbacks and panic attacks. Last time this happened to him, he died. He's going to be pretty useless.

Maybe I'll have them escape from the blood bank by the skin of their teeth and then have to go back and burn it down. Something. Because I'm like Larry. I don't actually like writing victims.

I got crit on Angry Bitter Angel from my Awesome RP Partner, which I will be incorporating in short order. Once I hear back from my Writing Buddy on Zombunnies, I'll incorporate those changes, and it'll be ready for subbing pretty quick, I think.

And anyone who's using Photobucket for a custom mood theme may have noticed that it went kerflooey. This is because Photobucket is being just as frelling stoopid as LJ is this month and incorporating unpopular changes that have their userbase looking for alternatives in droves. Whee. I fixed mine via the method espoused by the lovely and effulgent gorengal: To fix, you need to go to the edit moodtheme screen under customize journal appearance. See the beginning of the URLs that say http://s...? You need to replace every 's' with an 'i'. Took me ten minutes and was a pain, but I've got my mood back. THANKS, PHOTOBUCKET.

Apex has funded a Glitter and Mayhem anthology through Kickstarter, and they're doing an open call for subs. The deadline is March 15, and the wordcount limit is 6000.

I can totally write something for that. I figure I can take a couple of days to outline it, then basically do NaNo-style wordcount goals until it's done. It'll take a week. Then I can run it past the Hubby and the Usual Suspects, toss it my Writing Buddy's way, he'll have it back to me before the deadline, and I can edit it and send it in.

I even have a basic premise. Someone hires Ben to go undercover in a glam nightclub for supernatural critters because Reasons (someone's messing with the clientele via drugs? IDK, I said it was a basic premise). Somewhere in there, Janni is going to put makeup on him and do his hair, and he will be grouchy about it. So, yes. This will be fun.

In other news, I just re-read Unquiet Neighbors and don't hate it. I want to take another spin through Angry Bitter Angel and Janni's Story. I'm just having a hard time getting going today.