Know the Novel - Part Three: It is Written {A Writers Linkup)

Finally I have for you the third and final part of this linkup!

To be honest, I wasn't too eager to do this linkup cause, well, I stopped writing after writing the second part of this linkup. But I still planned to do it anyway, and I have been brainstorming on how to make it more interesting than "I basically have nothing for you so I'm writing boring answers". Yeah, no way I am writing a post like that.

So anyway, I have thought of ideas and I have more excitement since being encouraged by fellow blogger and fan of this story. Just ahhh, guys, her love for Smoke is just so heart-warming and amazing and it makes me 1000x times more excited and in love with this story. All your encouragement, kind words and fangirling means so much to me, girl. Just thank you, Maggie.💜

1. Firstly, how did writing this novel go all around?

Slow, but that's okay cause when I did wrote, it went pretty well. Yeah, I have scenes that suck, but I can fix them. I have fix some of them and they are now much better, so anything that isn't good in this book is redeemable and that's encouraging to see. And I am still at the beginning of the story (Smoke still hasn't gone off to find his sister) but I knew that would happen so I'm not disappointed or anything. I had no expectations, and it actually went better than I thought cause I wrote quite a bit during writing sprints. When I went to update my book progress here on my blog, it said it was about 13, 000 (I don't remember the exact number) and I finished November with 15, 999. I know I only updated once or twice at the beginning of November (with tiny changes) so saying about 13, 000 is a pretty good guess to what I started with when November came around. To be honest, I didn't expect that much words with the way I was writing at the beginning of November and before it too. So that's a victory. 

I also recently wrote for the first time in a while so now I'm over 16, 000. 😀

2. Did it turn out you expected or completely different? And how do you feel about the outcome?

Completely different, but I also had few expectations with this novel. But despite that I have still been surprised a lot at what has happened. Like the things I want to happen do happen but they also happen differently from what I imagined them to be. And so far I am love in the overall outcome.

3. What aspect of the story did you love writing about the most? (characters, plot, setting, prose, etc.)

This spot is shared with characters and plot, cause both have been amazing to write so far. Though if I have to pick one, it would be characters cause I. love. my. characters. so. much. Even though there are so many of them that I don't know what to do with them all. I was thinking the other day that books that I have been reading lately only have a few important characters to focus on and all of the rest are just minor. Well, a lot of my characters don't feel like they can stay in the minor box. They all seem important and they also have the feeling of having bigger roles in the future books. Brain may be screaming help right now. 😂

4. How about your least favourite part?

The worldbuilding... cause it doesn't exist and that automatically makes it the least favourite part. Descriptions would be second after that one. I am bad at descriptions in first drafts so I basically skim over them, either writing out a skeleton or nothing at all.

Hey, does anyone feel like they are reading similar answers? (No, I am not giving any context, hehe)

5. What do you feel like needs the most work?

Descriptions. So far my writing seems pretty good and I'm still proud of what I wrote. The prose, dialogue, characters, plot and whether else I'm may be missing about writing are all fairly structurally sound for a first draft. As in, they are not a complete mess. 😂

But I do have a big problem with not knowing how to describe Smoke's appearance. He's not the type at all to describe himself and he's the only POV in this story. 😱 

6. How do you feel about your characters now? Who's favourite? Least favourite? Anyone surprise you? Give us all of the details!

Okay, so I am going to ramble about every single character that I plan to appear in this novel. Cause there are a lot of characters I haven't even touched on yet and it's a shame cause I do love them to bits. As I had mentioned before, a lot of them also don't have important roles until book 2 or even 3. Basically for them this novel is their introduction cause introducing them when they are important won't make much sense since they are constantly in the background in the first novel. So they might get a brief mention, but I promise you all of them will talked about and this will probably be a long section. So make sure you're not busy.

I feel the same about my characters because I didn't write a lot about them this November. Which means I still adore the characters and still love the things that I mentioned that I loved about them. Hasn't changed or altered or anything yet. Too early in the novel for that (this statement, except for the first part, is only for the characters I have mentioned. The unknown ones don't apply here.)

And, yes, Smoke is my favourite of them all, which I'm sure you guessed by now if you have been following and reading my blog for a while now. (Yes, I pick favourites with characters. I know, it's horrifying but I can't help it and I'm not going to lie about that I do have favourites.) It is because he's just so complex and interesting. I am still learning new things about him even though I know him for about three years. He has a reason for everything. Why he acts the way he does, why he hates someone, why he loves them, why he even thinks about something. I know so much about him that he honestly feels so real. I cried literal tears for him, which shows just how real he is to me. He's an anti-hero and has bad/moody/emo boy vibes, but he's also a hero and does have such a caring, quiet personality. He's far from perfect and he knows it. He's never arrogant, but is very confident and sarcastic, so it may seem like he is full of himself and his abilities, but he's really the opposite. He's just a broken boy who's trying to survive in a harsh world. He's a warrior with so many fears that it is beyond comfortable. He daily hides behind a mask but does let in the girl who means the world to him. He is someone who struggles with mental health issues on daily basis. All this makes him so relatable to me and just deepens my appreciation for his humanity. He is more than a character, he's a person.

Of course, next favourites would be Blossom, Lon, Kayo and Gum. There's also Steel, Smoke's father (more on him later), Tree and Maciej, who is someone I won't say more on since his role in this book is to just show that he exists. Yeah, I'm spoiling that he's important for later but he has way more secrets and cool stuff that none of you will ever know unless you read the whole series.

Blossom is a bit of struggle to write since I have two images in my head of what I want her to be like. The best way to describe it would be the manic pixie dream girl trope and the strong woman trope mixed together. And, yeah, they are a bit of conflicting personalities that I'm trying to find the balance of, cause, to be honest, I just loved the two of these tropes stuck together like this. She really does seems like a character out of the box so I'm loving it even though it's hard to figure her out this way and not lean toward one or the other trope. I believe I am finally getting there.

There isn't much more to talk about Lon cause, well, he wants to keep his secrets and basically everything else about him quiet. And I learnt a new thing about Kayo through a song - he loves fire. Like it is his favourite thing to play with and use a weapon. Which isn't good for Smoke as he has a literal fear of fire. (Goodness, those two really have to clash don't they?) With Gum, there's still a lot about her that I need to discover in this book. I know what happens to her in the future but not the "present", which is book 1. I have left her alone basically cause she does an important role in this story and I just haven't reached it yet. I did her first appearance (which kinda of sucks cause it feels like a bit of info dump and the whole scene just doesn't show what I wanted to show, but her introduction now exists which is the main point cause I accidentally forgot it and in another scene Smoke acts like he met her. *facepalm* At least someone knows what they are doing, but isn't bad that it isn't the author?!)  

Who's this Tree that I mentioned there? Oh, just another minor character that has no importance until later. It's good to mention him cause I'm going to share a scene with him in it that happens to be the only scene he really shows up in. He might pop up in the background here and there throughout the book but I don't know at this stage.

There's also Simba, who is Blossom's father, but at this moment he doesn't exist. He hasn't showed up and no one has mentioned him. That really needs to be fixed cause Blossom is really close to her father and is important figure in her life. Also another father figure in Smoke's life. Blossom's family is like a second family to him, her sister was like his sister, and I still haven't showed that part of his life through the appearance of Simba? Very bad.

At this stage I have no feelings or thoughts on Polar, who is Smoke's twin sister, but I believe talking about her anyway has major spoilers so I'll stop there. And with Seek, Smoke's older brother, he's in the neutral spot for me at the moment but with the stuff I have planned with him later and the character he's slowly revealing himself to be, I feel that he will be another favourite of mine. It's just that that I haven't spend a lot of time with him yet. More than Simba, less than Steel.

One of my least favourite of characters would be Katie, who also hasn't showed up yet in this story even though she is meant to be the assistant/right hand girl to Lon and the best friend to Kayo. Though to be fair, both Lon and Kayo haven't been on the page much but still, she should be there and she's just isn't. She's a really cool character that I'm sure readers will enjoy. And her fashion style is something I really want to describe. Her main outfit is one that I have clear in my mind.

Other least favourites are Falcon, Moth and Daffodil. These three are the most underdeveloped out of all of the characters but I feel that they could be important to the story and I don't want to cut them out. Daffodil, who is the cousin to Gum, has more place than the other two, so it's unlikely that she will remove. I have plans for her. But with Falcon and Moth, especially Moth, finding their importance is hard. Falcon is the middle brother of Steel (he's the oldest) and Simba (youngest) and I feel that position is really important for the other brothers' stories. They need him, but I haven't figured it out yet. And Moth is Falcon's adopted niece, who important for showing a deep part of his personality, which is his caring nature. Without Moth I don't feel that nature will be showed as well. So this are the reasons for them staying. I know for sure that, except for maybe Falcon, these characters will remain minor unlike most of most characters in this.

Lastly, the characters who surprised me. The first one is, of course, Smoke, which as I have already mentioned in my last post, that he was much more sarcastic than I expected. But not only that, he keeps on showing me pieces of his soul that I didn't know existed. This character truly keeps me on my toes. And making me love him more. The other one is Steel. He surprised me by being a much more loving father than I planned him to be. I planned that him and Smoke are always having tension but the two revealed that they actually deeply love and care for each other and that they show it as best as they can. This change also really helped with the dead sister not being dead plot thread so I'm very happy with it and it's also nice to see that Smoke has someone else he really loves and care for other than Blossom. Also Lon surprised me by making himself really important in this story when I planned for him to be a minor character.     

😶 Told you it would be long.

7. What's your next plan of action with this novel?

To keep writing it and finish it. Never give up on it. This story is precious to me and I don't ever want to just set it aside. I still have the love for it despite the rocky journey of writing this, so I feel I'm going good with pursuing this story to the end.  

8. If you could have your greatest dream realised for this novel, what would it be?

Okay, so the most realistic dream, which I will be happy with for the rest of my life, would be getting this book and its series traditionally published. Yeah, I know that it is my only second novel and all, but I really want it to happen. My plan is to write it until it can be publishable. Which means that I will be revising this book and its companions a lot cause I just want that to happen. If I could only pick one series to publish, it would be this one. Why? Mainly because I have so much passion for what this series has the potential to tell. What this series could tell to the world. I got a feeling that it could touch lives. Which of course is the best dream of all and what I really want when I want to get this publish someday. I really, deeply, want to encourage, impact or inspire someone, particularly a teenager since they are my targeted audience (I have a reason for this but I won't go into it today). So I will try very hard to reach for this dream. So far it seems like God might want this to happen since he has place such a story on my heart that, as I mentioned above, I truly feel that other people might need to read. It's just a feeling though. I will see for sure further down the road.

But the other, optional, dream would be seeing this story as a movie. If it ever does, it of course has to be Japanese. The cast must be all Japanese people and would be great if the film crew had a bunch of Japanese people working in it. Like at least the screenwriter would be Japanese and the costume designer. Or it gets turned into an anime. Anime has inspired this story a lot, so honestly that would be so cool if it does become one.

Yeah, I dream big.

9. Share some of your favourite snippets!

*Squeals* I am excited about this. Since I left you last time with little snippets, I am now going to give longer snippets, which all happen to be my favourite scenes so far. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed writing them.

"You need to stop sulking and come back." Blossom walked into the room with knocking, leaving it open and leaning against the door frame. I'm guessing Father and Seek aren't around or she wouldn't have left it open. She respected my privacy. Our conversations always seem to include something that I hadn't uttered to anyone else.

"I'm not sulking. I'm processing." I was lying on my bed upon my stomach, cause let's face it, the bed was way more comfortable than the floor with its thin, hard carpet. As long as I don't fall asleep on it again, I should be fine to use it with no problems.

"And that's not sulking?" Her amusement was strong in her tone. Clearly, she didn't believe me.

I pulled the pillow closer to me, pressing it against my chest and placing my chin on top of it. "Girl, you are cute but not dumb. I don't need to explain to you."

"Yes, you do. Your brain works in strange ways."

I groaned into my pillow. "I hate you."

"No, you love me."

I lifted my head up from the pillow and stared at her without blinking. "No, I literally, really, hate you."

"Sure you do."

"I am being serious."

"Not, you're not. You're being dramatic."

"Oh, because you know me?" I broke into a smile. "Does mean that I really don't need to explain anything?"

"Okay, you win. A pathetic victory at that, but you are petty so you should be proud of this."

 "I am."

She pushed away from the door frame, crossing her arms over her chest. "I also think that it is petty that you're ignoring Lon like this. You know it won't make a difference and will probably just get you into trouble."

I suppressed another groan. "I miss the old [his real name here] - the old Lon. He was so full of life and fun and -"

"And innocent."

"Yes, innocent."

She sighed. She walked over and I shifted to give her more room on the bed. She settled into a cross-legged position. "Smoke..."

I rested my chin back on the pillow. "I'm not ready. I can't face him."

 

My only comment is how brutal Blossom can be. Did you see that attitude? They are really perfect for each other, aren't they? 😀 (Also this is the piece that I recently wrote.)

 

"Smoke." I put my hands in my pockets, of the jacket that I had put on while I was heading here. "And I'm guessing you got a new name?" I tried to ignored the sickness at the sight of his twin not moving an inch since I came in. 

He nodded. "Tree."

I sighed, leaning into the end of Tree's bed. I see no point in small talk. I was never real friends with him. "You might be aware that your operations were an accident."

"Well, I -" his voice broke at that word - "knew the war is over. It's nice to know that this is at least a mistake." His tone was so flat, so... dejected.

I clenched my teeth. He hadn't told them. I'm going to kill him.

Finally giving in the urge, I peered more closely at the other boy, who was breathing evenly, normally. He seemed to be sleeping. But something was wrong.

I caught Tree's eyes, looking deep into their yellow, cat-like depths. What an odd colour to choose. He must have an interesting taste of style. At first, they seemed fine, but then I caught a look that was all too familiar. He was grieving.

He glanced down at the sheets covering his legs, like he knew what I saw. I sucked in a breath; all words stuck in my throat.

I pushed pass the lump. "I hate to ask, but...is he dying?" Oh, please, no. Not again. Not now.

He released a sob before speaking. "They said he won't woke up again. He isn't dying... yet. But he can't wake up."

Well, that is worse. "My sympathies. And I mean it. I know what it feels like." Not long ago, but long ago at the same time, I had that experience. Losing someone to the operation while I lived through it.

He still didn't look up. He was probably struggling with the sensation that he couldn't shed tears anymore. "What is going to happen to me?"

"The plan is to have you help with gathering and assigning places to hide the well-known cyborgs in our country. So that it seems like the world's most dangerous weapons have been gotten rid of." I cringed. Were we just weapons? Now useless? I shook away my frustration for a moment. "But considering your situation, I believe that resting is the best option. That is, if you don't feel the motivation to do... well, anything."  I was one of those who couldn't do much when depressed or grieved, but I knew Blossom to be the opposite.

He lifted his face then, and that time I noticed the scars across both cheeks. They were like claw marks, maybe from a cat. I blinked. Scars on a brand-new cyborg? One who hasn't even seen the battlefield? No one in their right mind would leave scars like those. And the weird thing is that they looked like they were part of the design, so flawlessly part of his skin.

He brushed the strands of his hair away, making it clear that I wasn't crazy in what I was seeing. I tried to not gap at him, waiting for his answer.

Letting out a long sigh, one laced with weariness, he said, "I don't know what would be good for me right now. I just... can't."

I bit my lip, then quickly removed my teeth, hoping that he didn't noticed. That was Blossom's habit, not mine, though my brain seems to want to pick it up. This wasn't the first time I had done it. "I understand. I'll come back when... it is a better time."

"Thank you." He glanced over at his brother. "Is there really no way to fix him?"

Expression don't betray me now. "There is nothing available, no."

"Available?" The slump in his shoulders straightened.

"Don't read into that."

"Why not? If a chance exists, I want to do it. No matter the cost. I want him back."

Lon is probably going to kill me for this. Oh well. "He has a chance if he becomes a Flawless cyborg." Tree almost leapt out of bed from the information. I held up a finger, stopping him in his tracks. "But it is illegal now to create a Flawless. Plus, people who know how to do the operation are few and won't do it for you."

"Why not?"

"Because either they abide to the rules or they hate creating a Flawless for whether personal reasons. As far I know, there are no one in-between. Luckily for our government."

He sank down into the pillows. "Is there really no one I can convince?"

Lon, Simba, Falcon... "No. I know some of them personally, and they are very firm in all of their decisions. In other words, stubborn. You won't get get even a budge out of them."

"Who are they?"

I shook my head. "I'm sorry, but I've already given you too much information. And seriously, you should give up this false hope anyway. It won't happen."

"I don't think it is a false hope." He slipped out of his bed and sat on the edge of his brother's, stroking his white and black hair. The hair was mostly dyed white but at the back of his head it was still black. I could see that because his head was turned in such a way to make it visible.

Hardening myself against the affection, I snapped, "Well, you're stupid." I turned on my heel, took a few steps, then halted. I sighed. "For your sake, I wish you would accept the fact. There is no reason to put yourself through so much pain. It won't change the outcome." I know from experience.

He stopped the motion of playing with his brother's hair. He seemed to be thinking of his words carefully. Not good. "I understand. I just need time."

I raised my eyebrow. He couldn't see it because my back was toward him. He's lying or jumping around the truth. "Of course." I spun back around to face him. "But one more thing I have to ask."

He stiffened. Ha, got him. "What is it?"

"Do you have any family members?"

His shoulders relaxed a little. "Only my parents."

"And they know of your condition? Both of you?"

"They are aware that we will be cyborgs now. We used to live with them." You'd think so with 16 year olds. "But I'm not sure if they know about... this." He waved at his brother's form.

"Do you want them to be contacted or you don't think they'll accept you now?"

"I'm not certain."

"Do you want someone to inform them -"

"I would like to do myself. To tell them... that one of their sons didn't make it."

That's an impersonal response. Not close to them, are you? "Of course. We will give you space and time to do it."

"Thank you. You've been... very thoughtful and kind about this. Most of the people I have met since waking up have been like robots."

My smile was faint. "Well, they have seen too much in their days."

"And you haven't?"

I was taken aback. A part of me wanted to scream, I have see too much. But that will be admitting that, somehow, I was still compassionate. And I know I am not. I can treat people well if I want to, but I am not compassionate. Not anymore. "I'm not sure. I was only in the war for two years."

"This is just about the war?"

"The war is where most of the scars come from."

The way he regarded me made me want to hit him. "Did anyone ever figure out what caused the fire?"

I shifted on my feet. I need to get out of here. I can't breathe. "No. No one did."

"I'm sorry." He had the dignity to avert his eyes. I still can't breathe.

I shrugged, pretending indifference. I am not falling apart in front of someone who was basically a stranger to me. No, I will not fall apart. But I can't breathe. 

 I basically wrote out the whole scene cause it is so good, you guys. I'm very proud of this. To me, it is basically perfect. It has foreshadowing, references to past stuff, is emotional and clearly shows Smoke's personality. This is him in action. And I have to say that this is a top favourite with me, along with the scene that I showed a part of in the last post (it is the second snippet). Also fun fact: this scene (which I haven't finish yet) is last one I wrote in November.  

As I stepped through the gate and up the path, Father looked up and looked toward me. He waited.

I brushed my fingers along the top of "my sister's" gravestone. "Are you sure this time?"

"There is still uncertainty. Just like all the rest."

I grabbed his arm. "Father, I think I should go check myself. If this girl is her, then I will bring her back. Home."

He was silent. I gripped the stone with my other hand, breaking the tips of my nails.

"It might be painful."

I sucked in a breath, turning my head away from him. "What do you know, anyway?"

I heard him moved toward me. Felt his hand touch my face. I looked at him again. "As much as a father should about their son."

I choked back the sound of a sob. He had noticed me more than I thought.

"I know that I haven't always been the most attentive parent. I know that trying to find your sister hurts you..." He ran his hand though my hair.

"You can't rest until you know what happened to her."

He nodded. "Yes." He spoke that word so softly I could barely hear him.

  I forced a smile. "That's why I want to do this. If I can't do it for myself, I can do it for your sake."

He gazed at me. This time he held my face with both of his hands. "You're not going alone, are you?"

"No. I plan to bring Blossom and the new girl... Gum, I think she's called."

"Why her?"

I shrugged. "I can't really explain it, but besides Blossom and you, she is the only other person I trust."

"How can you trust someone you barely know?" He sounded puzzled.

"I guess it's a human instinct... or stupidity."

"I think I understand that."

I laughed. I knew he didn't fully understand. But he would always try to make a guess, would try to make himself feel that feeling.

And this part where Smoke mentions Gum even though he hasn't met her on page yet. And this also happens to be the last scene I wrote before blank page. (if you haven't guessed it, I have been jumping around my novel so the scenes I have wrote recently wrote are not in chronological order. This scene is the last one in the book at the moment but I wrote it ages ago.)

10. Did you glean any new writing and/or life lessons from writing this novel?

Yes, definitely, even though I haven't even gone past the beginning. I am really learning my writing style and voice better in this one, how I plot (I think I am a combo of a plotter and a pantser but I'm not setting that in stone yet), all of those little tiny details in writing. I can tell that I am writing with all of the advice and information that I have picked up (I have done a lot of reading this year about writing). My writing needs work but with this novel for sure I am learning to make it more less than a mess and perfecting it to be publishable. I know my writing isn't perfect and it won't ever reach perfection, which I don't care about, but it can be perfect enough. That's where I am heading with my writing at the moment. Writing until I get to my dream of thinking of publishing.

And with life lessons, well, you may noticed me saying "the value of humans" at the end of my first post in this linkup. Today, I am going to go deeper into this, even though I haven't reach much of thematic moments in this story yet. But just because my hands haven't been working, it doesn't mean that my mind hasn't and oh, boy, the discoveries in my head alone are just amazing. I know the ideas are really going to shine once they get on the page. 

So, I have been learning just what it means to be human. Not just human, but the one in God's eyes. I don't know how accurate my view is, as after all I can't truly see through his eyes, but I feel that I have discovered a glimpse of what humanity really means to him. Why just in general humans should be seen as worthy, precious, beautiful, amazing. Sometimes I think that a lot of people forget just how priceless they are. I don't blame anyone for it. It is easy to forget with all of the hate, hurt and the general brokenness that makes humans unbearable. But it needs to be remembered again. And this story, its series, is being used for just that.  

These characters are teaching me about humanity in a way I haven't seen or heard or read before. Six of Crows has come close to this, but as I am looking at this like how I believe God looks at humans, it makes this more much powerful to me.

"Never take away from us what makes us humans."

(Here's a quote that doesn't exist, but I see Smoke saying this in the future.)

WOW. This is a monster of a post. You're welcome. I have achieved my goal of creating answers despite the lack of writing. 👏

Here's a shower of links cause I forgot them in my last post:

Know the Novel - Part Two: Within the WIP

In case that you wanted to checked out this post and see others' Know the Novel posts.

Know the Novel - Part Two: Within my WIP

Here's a link to my previous post in case you wanted to check it out again or for the first time.

Know the Novel - Part One: Introduction into my WIP

And a link to the first post of mine in this linkup if you want to check it out for... reasons.

Know the Novel - Part Three: It is Written

If you want to join in or see others' posts. 

Merry Christmas everyone! I pray that y'all have an awesome Christmas!

So what do you all think about my WIP now? Have a favourite character yet?