A.J. Maguire

Tag: A.J. Maguire

  • National Novel Writing Month – 2014

    That’s right. I’m one of those crazy people, the one’s who take November and turn it into a month-long marathon with words.

    I went grocery shopping and stocked up on caffeine, chocolate, and popcorn. I made sure my son had a new Wii game to entertain himself while my brain is occupied in all things Dead Weight. (Yes, that’s the title of the new manuscript.)

    I revisited the series Bible — because this is the second book in a much larger series — and plucked out the items I want to explore in this book.

    … and since the first book hasn’t come out yet I’m not allowed to share any of them with you. Cause … you know … spoilers.

    I can talk about theme’s, though!

    Complicated, fun, themes!

    So … Tapped, the first book, is centered on the theme of family. Real easy to spot. You’ll see it when the book hits virtual shelves in January. (January 13, 2015. No, I haven’t forgotten. Yes, I am still playing with formatting and such.)

    Dead Weight’s theme is “letting go.”

    I know, it’s not one word. We’re supposed to try and filter everything down to a one-word theme and all that but … No. Screw the rules. That’s my theme.

    I don’t have a word count yet because it’s all handwritten but I’ll make sure to post such a thing on Friday. Until then … I’ve got writing to do.

    Go, NaNo-People! Let’s get this done!

  • Self-Publishing Journal Entry #1

    Dear Diary,

    10676192_782868888436280_3445750894630733710_nI have taken to talking to my cat again. Whilst my son slumbers and I work late into the night the big orange beast is the only company I have, and in my sleep-deprived delirium I might have dreamed up his responses. I have no one to blame but myself, I know.

    I am the one who decided I wanted the manuscript to go out to Beta readers Monday morning.

    I am the one who scheduled a 48 hour timetable over the weekend to take the first pass at the manuscript.

    Well, it wasn’t the first pass. Technically speaking that was the 4th. It just happened to be the first read-through since deciding to embark on the self-publishing journey.

    I am also the one who spent a disgraceful amount of time hunting through pre-made cover art. I still haven’t found the right one and am resigning myself to the idea that I’m going to have to commission someone.

    My cat insists I should save my money for soft food. He is quite peeved at me for not having purchased any in IMG_0051over a month. But he’s gotten a trifle pudgy so I’ve limited him to hard food until Thanksgiving or Christmas.

    I am slightly concerned that he might take matters into his own hands and either bite my feet in protest or opt to rage-vomit. (He does this whenever I leave for the weekend to let me know his displeasure.)

    On a good note, he is supportive of the self-publishing idea. I know because he sits on the back of my chair and purrs, creating a pleasant vibration for me while I work. It’s like a mini-massage thing only fuzzy and better. I fully believe that his presence helped me get through that 48 read-through period and, while some of the emails to my Beta readers might not have made a lot of sense, at least they got out in time.

    I’ll score this as a win.

  • Gutter Space

    Last year I made a few print copies of Persona for my family. (No, it is not for sale. Yet.) But anyway, I discovered this rather annoying problem with my Word program when it came to converting the text for printing.

    Every page needed a designated amount of “gutter space.” This is the space that you see right in the middle of the book when you open it up, the little “gutter” that is created where the binding comes together. For whatever reason, my Word program could not target even versus odd pages, forcing me to spend FOUR HOURS going through each individual page and shifting them over.

    As evidenced by what happened next, shifting text is quite boring.

    “Gutter space” sounded so … sordid. Kind of seedy, you know?

    I decided that what “Gutter Space” really stood for was that place where all rejected novels go, and for four hours that late November night I let my creative brain run rampant. It was quite entertaining. I had a main hero named Partial (standing for Partially Formed Idea) who was met by several different novels, all of them with some form of book disease.

    My personal favorite was Multiple POV Disorder where the inflicted novel kept switching characters mid-sentence.

    In any case, I sort of let “Gutter Space” fade away after I finished shifting text but this week I caught myself in that weird transitional period between projects. And, lo and behold, Gutter Space came back to mind. As much as I loved the concept of Partial being introduced to every manner of writing mistake (like Purple Prose Syndrome, which was so full of unnecessary description that it continued to just describe things around it rather than address anything of worth to the plot) I’m not quite ready to write that short story.

    But trust me, I will.

    For now, I’ve decided that “Gutter Space” will be anything and everything that my brain needs to clean out before it’s ready to start on a new project.

    So what is my “Gutter Space” comprised of today?

    Well … Here’s my line-up …

    1) Residual Haunting — needs completion (But it’s also my next project so I don’t need to worry so much.)

    2) Persona — needs a new ending (Already got this baby scheduled.)

    3) Usurper — needs an edit or … uh … 5 (Pardon me as I hide from all Trenna fans. I already promised it would be out in 2015!)

    4) Primal — needs re-written or … brainstormed or … something

    5) Dead Weight — needs completion

    6) The Abolitionist — needs research

    … My car needs cleaning too.

    And I should wash my carpets ’cause … Winter is coming.

    And there you have it … That’s what’s in my Gutter Space today. Starting next week I’ll be diving headlong into Residual Haunting and posting it, as promised, for free on Wattpad. It will be completed by the end of October, which frees up my November for NaNoWriMo where I will either be working on Primal or The Abolitionist.

    We’ll see.

  • Meet My Character Blog Tour

    Shen Hart tagged me in the “Meet My Character Blog Tour” and I’ve been sitting on this for a couple of days, trying to decide who I was going to “tag” in response. I’ve decided on Lisa (LJ) Cohen, RJ Blain, and Skye Taylor. Good luck and have fun! 

    1) What is the name of your character?  Is she fictional or a historic person?

    Johanna Rorry — otherwise known as Jorry. She is purely fictional. 

    2) When and where is the story set?

    The story is set many, many, many years into the future. We get to go spelunking on Pluto, lay siege to a space station orbiting Neptune, and infiltrate a military base on Europa but in between all of that the characters are on board the hauler-class vessel known as the Zephyr. 

    3) What should we know about him?

    Ahem. You mean “her.”

    And you should know that when she sets her mind to something she doesn’t waver. She’s a complicated mix of soldier and mother, capable of hacking into computer systems and constantly focused on the safety of her family. 

    4) What is the main conflict? What messes up his her life?

    Her son Devon wants to go to University, but because Jorry and her counterpart (Seach Barlow) are both deserters from the military this poses many problems. Sending Devon to school could reveal their whereabouts to the military they’ve been running from. So Jorry makes a black market deal to get Devon some security tags that won’t alert the Universe that she’s still alive and still allow him to go to school. 

    And … you know … things go very, very wrong. 

    5) What is the personal goal of the character?

    She wants to see her son safe and happy. 

    6) Is there a working title for this novel, and can we read more about it?

    The tentative title is Tapped and you can read a snippet of it on my main website ajmaguire.com. (HINT: It’s under the science fiction tab.)

    7) When can we expect the book to be published?

    Well, I have a rule that I send out everything to the traditional market first and if it doesn’t get any bites then I look into Indie publishing. So I’m really not sure. It could be out sometime in 2015 or it could be later.

     

  • Writing Hard Scenes

    For the past several weeks I have agonized over one particular scene. It’s an important scene. Plot happens. Torture happens. Characters react in various ways to said torture, thus revealing more about who they are as people and making the book quite a bit more profound than it would have been otherwise. 

    One problem. 

    I don’t know how to torture someone. 

    Honestly, there’s a part of me that’s quite annoyed at having researched proper torture techniques. I mean, who wants to know that stuff?

    This scene was extremely difficult to write both because I didn’t know anything about torture and because I didn’t know how to properly convey someone being tortured. I almost tried scrap the scene, to just “fade to black” and let the Reader’s imagine what was going on, then come back later during the rescue. 

    But I couldn’t do that because the scene really does reveal more about the relationship between our hero and the antagonist. It shows how far both are willing to go to get what they want.

    And I knew that if I scrapped it, I would be cheating myself out of a growth moment as a writer.

    Writing the hard scenes is what helps challenge us as writers.

    Yes, we need editors to help us do that too. Yes, we need to read books that help us grasp story structure and characterization.

    But we also need to face those scenes that frighten us because it is only through those scenes or genres or points of view that we can truly take ownership of our craft.

    So.

    I wrote a torture scene.

    It took me several weeks and I cringed while I was doing it, but I know (and the Readers will know) just who these two people are because of it.  

  • How to Write a Dude

    Devon Barlow is a headstrong young man nearing his twenty-first birthday. He’s highly intelligent, very physically active (he goes spelunking on Pluto, how cool is that?) and he has a strong suspicion that his parents might just be pirates. Save for brief forays on Mars or Earth during the holiday seasons, Devon has lived the bulk of his life on board Zephyr, a hauler-class space ship. 

    I am a thirty-something single mother who reads too much and spends an embarrassing amount of time on video games. (Hey, games help keep my creative brain fresh and stuff. Don’t judge.)

    So how does a thirty-something single mother find the “voice” of a twenty-year-old boy in order to believably display his character on the page?

    Well … I read a lot. 

    I did say I read too much, didn’t I?

    In this case I deliberately hunted for books with young male points of view (really not that hard to do, you can find them in just about every book you pick up) and I studied them. I looked at what they thought or felt or did differently from how I might have reacted in any given situation and I jotted it down in a notepad. 

    I also talked to guy friends. If there was a situation happening on Zephyr in the book that could be easily translated into day-to-day life, I would nudge a guy and ask; “Hey, when you were twenty what would you have done if …”

    Disclaimer: These friends know I am an author. They find it highly amusing when I quiz them about what it’s like to be a dude and are more than happy to help out. However … most of them still think I’m crazy so … do this at your own peril. 

    That said, Devon Barlow might be a twenty-year-old young man but he is also a human being. He may think and feel differently from me but that does not mean I cannot relate to him. (Except for the pirate thing. I never suspected my parents of being pirates.)

    Fiction is the place where we can mind-meld with the world around us. It helps us understand people precisely because we find ourselves relating to characters vastly different from us. It teaches us to look at the core motivation in people because we know that, male or female, that motivation is what’s going to define them as a person.

    So!

    How to write a dude when you’re a girl?

    1) Read. (You should be doing this anyway if you’re a writer.)

    2) Observe and/or ask your guy counterparts.

    3) Find the core motivation.

    … and if anyone else has tricks to writing the opposite gender I’m happy to hear them. I’m sure I missed a few.  

  • Attack of the Secondary Character – Round Robin Discussion

    The beast roared again.

    It knew Relo was there.  It had known the moment he’d walked into the cave, its heightened sense of taste and smell had alerted the beast to this trespass.  But Relo had anticipated this.  In thirty-four years as a Tapped Acolyte he’d hunted every species Nellis had to offer.  He knew each weakness, each strength, and when Nellissian people were threatened, he had no qualms about exploiting such knowledge.  This, after all, was not a matter of fair play but a matter of survival.

    Me: Relo … huh … that’s an interesting name. Sounds kinda like “reload” which makes sense given the whole science fiction element, right?

    Cat: meow?

    Me: (Because I really am crazy enough to discuss these things with my pets) I know, I know. Relo … what? Relo Bomani? Sounds exotic and … you know … they’re on an alien planet and all … OK. So … the hero’s name is Relo Bomani.

    …. approximately 700 words later ….

    “I see I missed the action,” Seach said.  Most of his face was still in shadow but Relo knew the man was frowning.

    “It was a surprisingly fast battle.” Relo looked down at his thigh and tried to determine how bad the wound was.

    Seach walked to him, fixing the light on his wounded leg. “But not uneventful. Sit still.”

    “Actually, I think I cut myself on its tail when I tried to get out of the way.” Relo took the phosphorous light from Seach and angled it so his friend could work.

    Seach snorted his amusement as he crouched beside him, slipping the pack off his shoulder as he did so. “Serves you right for coming out here alone. I swear, sometimes I think you are trying to die.”

    Me: … huh … I like this Seach fellow.

    Cat: (just purrs cause by now he’s laying on my feet)

    … 3000 words later …

    Me: Ugh. I hate this book. I do not like the way it’s going. Relo is too … just too … strong. Not enough vulnerability in him. And he’s not funny.

    Cat: (lots of meowing cause he’s crazy enough to think I can understand him)

    Me: I know! Seach is so much more interesting. He makes me laugh. And he’s not afraid to fail. I totally love him.

    Cat: (stops meowing because I’m scratching under his chin and he’s in kitty heaven)

    Me: But you know, I’m not liking much of this plot either. Let’s change everything. We’ll make Seach the hero. Keep Jorry as the female lead. Relo can be the secondary.

    Cat: (suddenly bops me on the hand because he’s had enough attention for one day but he’s too lazy to move out of hands reach)

    … About a year later … 

    “You know Jorry won’t drink that,” said a familiar voice.

    Seach relaxed and glanced at Lieutenant Cavil as they continued through the D-Fac. Her black hair was shaved close and he could see little spirals of dark curls pressed up against her scalp. She grinned at him, her teeth bright white against the backdrop of her ebony skin. Cavil was beautiful in that hard way that military officers could be. It was like all the training and battle she had seen managed to sharpen her appeal and for half a second he forgot the danger they were in.

    “Lieutenant Cavil,” he said with a smile. In his peripheral view he saw Jo look up from her computer. “It’s been a while. Decided you were ready to tell me your first name?”

    “It’s been two years and eight months,” Cavil said and laughed. “I thought you would have lost interest by now.”

    “Lost interest in a beauty like you?” Seach clucked his tongue and winked at her. “Never.”

    … So … Have I ever had a secondary character steal a book from me?

    Yes. Very much so. I revamped all of Tapped to accommodate a new hero in Seach and I have never regretted it. He’s funny and vulnerable and he really made the story for me. He even counterbalances Jorry as the lead female character precisely because of those traits.

    Hop over to some of my fellow authors to see if they’ve ever dealt with a scene-stealing secondary character before!

    Marci Baun  http://www.marcibaun.com/
    Anne Stenhouse http://annestenhousenovelist.wordpress.com
    Fiona McGier http://www.fionamcgier.com
    A.J. Maguire https://ajmaguire.wordpress.com/ (YOU ARE HERE)
    Beverley Bateman http://beverleybateman.blogspot.ca/
    Diane Bator http://dbator.blogspot.ca/
    Margaret Fieland http://margaretfieland.com/my_blog
    Victoria Chatham www.victoriachatham.webs.com
    Connie Vines http://connievines.blogspot.com/
    Geeta Kakade http://geetakakade.blogspot.com/
    Rhobin Courtright http://rhobinleecourtright.com

  • Dead Magic Release!

    Witch-Born fans can rejoice today! (That’s right, I said “rejoice” because we really don’t use that word often enough these days.) The sequel and (likely) final chapter of the steampunk-magic-imbued saga has been released through Double Dragon Publishing. 

    Yes, yes, I know … “But you just had your first science fiction (Deviation) released last week!”

    Quiet, mongrels! You’re not rejoicing like I told you to! 

    (I might be a little spirited today. The strap on my favorite purse broke and I am torn between grieving it and celebrating the new release. I apologize for any and all shenanigans.)

    But no, seriously, Dead Magic is officially released. See its understated and quietly brilliant purchase link at the side of this post … Or if you don’t like sidebars you can follow this link to its brand new Amazon page. 

    Marvel at the steampunky cover art (created by the ever-so talented Deron Douglas)

    deadmagic-510

    Why yes, that does appear to be a naked man in the background. See the tattoos? Witch-Born fans should automatically recognize them!

    Bask, my lovelies, in the blurby thingy that must be placed on all books … 

    Return to the Steam Punk world of Magnellum for the second book in the “Witch-Born” series.

    Magic is gone and Valeda Quinlan knows it, she just can’t prove it. Determined to learn the truth, Valeda finds herself at the mercy of Elsie Delgora, the last known Witch to have ever seen Magic. Scrambling for survival amidst the noble Houses of Magnellum, Valeda agrees to help Elsie in return for Magic’s location. But the help Elsie needs is more than Valeda bargained for. Sent on a mission to find Lord Winslow Agoston, Valeda is confronted by powers far beyond any Witch-Born and forced to take on an even larger role in the fate of Magnellum.

    In all seriousness this book was a joy to write. I had fun with Valeda and Winslow and I sincerely hope everyone else will too. 

  • Terraforming Mars

    Deviation, my newly released science fiction, lands smack dab on Mars.

    In spite of the massive amounts of research I had a lot of fun on Mars. Actually, scratch that.

    Because of the massive amounts of research I had to do, I had a lot of fun on Mars. Astronomy fascinates me. I think stars are cool and pictures of nebula are awesome and … yeah, I’m a nerd. So it’s only natural that my first science fiction novel actually features another planet.

    Mars is the planet we tend to like the most when it comes to the idea of relocating the human race. (Or at least branching out. Earth still needs our tender loving care.)

    planet-mars1There are many reasons for this but in the interest of this post I’m just going to direct you to HowStuffWorks.com because they already have an awesome article on the hows and the why’s of it. (Yay! Kevin Bonsor!)

    Now, I understand that I cheated a bit when it came to terraforming Mars in my book, but that all boils down to story. I wasn’t writing a guidebook to terraforming a planet, I was writing a story about redemption and grief and relationships.

    That said, I still wanted to make it believable.

    I also wanted to give the information without overwhelming readers with technical jargon. So I made a timeline with news articles. Readers will notice that there’s a snippet of a news article at the beginning of every chapter. That’s where I provided information both on what happened to the female race and how humanity reached Mars.

    First we bombed the core … cause Earth’s weird half-molten center is what gives us the tectonic plates, which is what gives us the magnetic field and atmosphere that keeps us … you know … alive and stuff. There’s probably a lot of things wrong with the theory of bombing the Martian core but the very concept made my creative brain go into hyper-drive, so I used it.

    Then, because things weren’t growing fast enough for us, we built a mirror-like greenhouse thing around Mars. (No, really, check out the HowStuffWorks.com article. It’s totally plausible.) Mars is further away from the sun so we needed to catch all that heat and redirect it to the planet’s surface.

    And then … and this is my favorite part … we “seed bombed” the planet’s surface.

    Yes, that’s right. Seed bombs. They are exactly what they sound like; bombs with seeds and fertilizer and all the good stuff plants need to get started.

    Add a little water, a little time, and a lot of luck and viola! Terraforming!

    Now then … scientists across the globe are likely to slaughter me for turning Mars purple and genetically altering animals to live on the planet. Those are all story elements. I rely heavily on the fact that I am not a scientist, I am a novelist. In those instances I would hope that people remember they are reading a work of fiction and focus instead on the characters rather than the mechanics.

    Deviation-510Honestly, I think we’ll live on Mars one day. It won’t be tomorrow, but some day.

  • Deviation Release!

    If I had spaceship shaped confetti I would totally be throwing it everywhere right now!

    My first ever science fiction, Deviation, has been released by Double Dragon Publishing. For right now I only have the publisher’s purchase link but as soon as it becomes available on Amazon and Barnes&Noble I’ll be certain to shove those links up everywhere.

    Look at the pretty, shiny cover!

    Look at all the pretty colors!

    See the pretty shiny blurby thingy! (OK, so this is the longer version. You can see the shorter version everywhere else.)

    On the brink of a religious war between Makeem and Novo Femina, Celeocia Prosser’s struggle for gender equality leads her to Reesa Zimms; the one woman in all of history who can identify the first Mavirus victim. Believing the information surrounding this patient zero to be pivotal in the fight against the Makeem, Celeocia sets her sights on Reesa Zimms, also known as Caresse Zimmerman.

    There’s just one problem; Reesa Zimms is a science fiction novelist who lived and died hundreds of years in the past.

    Utilizing wormhole travel and antimatter discs, Celeocia sends her son Hedric and the crew of the Lothogy careening through time. When Hedric finds Reesa, the novelist is accompanied by her best friend Kate, who just happens to look like his recently murdered wife.

    Stunned and reeling, Hedric abducts both women, bringing Reesa and Kate on a not­so­gentle ride into the future.

    Time travel might be easier for Reesa to accept because Hedric Prosser, the High Priestess, and the very ship they’re traveling on, all belong in Reesa’s novels. Confused and pretty sure she’s going insane; Reesa tries to prepare her friend Kate for the very male­dominated society they’ve been dumped into. When she finds herself abandoned by Hedric, Reesa must rely on Matthew Borden, the villain of her books, to rescue Kate and fight their way home.

    Hear my squeal of delight to finally see this work out in the open!

    No, seriously, Deviation and I have a rather long history. I started writing it in 2008 through Lazette Gifford’s Two Year Novel Course — which I highly recommend for anyone who has been toying with the idea of writing a novel but feels they don’t have the time.

    I actually took the class, which started the first week of January so when I say I started writing it in 2008 I really mean I started writing it in 2008. Which means I’ve been working on/editing/shopping this book around to various publishers for six years now.

    Six!

    I could blame this on the fact that I was in school for three of those years, but the truth is that I was just nervous. This is my first science fiction ever and I wanted to at least try to get it right.

    So … I did a lot of research. Granted, I deliberately ignored some of said research because … you know … FICTION … and I needed things to work with the story. But still, I did a LOT of research.

    Mars in particular was fun but I’ll make a whole post dedicated to Mars and all the things I broke while trying to make the planet habitable.

    Not today, though.

    Today I’m throwing confetti and marveling at the artistic talents of my publisher and enjoying general revelry.