I try to remind myself that I can say something today that I couldn’t say last year, and honestly wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to say: I’m done with my first draft! I’m in the editing/revision step. How would me-one-year-ago feel if I could go into the future and read this post?

I have-to-have-to-have-to keep editing if I ever want to finish this novel, seek publication, go to places like Worldcon and World Fantasy, network and meet people, and have fun writing more novels.  And I intend to do just that. But I can’t just write ‘I need to get scene X done by date Y’. It’s never been that simple for me; conventional methods never seem to work.

A good example of this is I don’t remember long sequences of numbers (such as telephone numbers, numerical passwords, and my social security number) by memorizing the numerals outright like a normal person would. Instead, I remember them by mentally recalling the geometric patterns they make when typed out on a numerical keypad.  (weird, eh?)

So bear with me—I may have to get a bit experimental here on the ol’ blog, testing the waters to see what works and what doesn’t when it comes to getting me in this chair to edit.

I’ve mentioned a few times that I wanted to attempt writing annotations. In fact, I already did scene-by-scene annotations when I started writing the first draft of Five Rings. (Found starting here, and actually that’s a special post because that’s the first time I met packsister. Obviously annotations worked well back then and got me fired up about the project. And if you click that link I’ll warn you: much has changed storywise since October 4th, 2008.)

Annotations are usually reserved as supplements to already existing books, to be read by fans alongside the novel. Especially the second time through.

However, offering annotations here early on should (give me plenty to talk about, and) offer great insight to some the struggles I’ve gone through, the deeper hidden meanings and inspiration behind scenes; basically what my general thought process has been.

From my main page’s introduction:

“And if you’d like, you’re welcome to follow along as I complete my first novel.”

And what better way to allow people to follow along than through use of annotations?

I’ve been afraid to start posting these because I knew when I finally did, I’d better mean business.

Well, I do mean business. The more I put this thing off, the longer it takes to get finished and published. And the worse I feel inside.

So! If I haven’t posted an annotation in a long time, I’m either:

A. slacking-off and somebody needs to smack me upside the head.

B. really into writing and editing without stopping to do an annotation.

C. dead.

‘A’ is the most likely culprit. So even if you choose not to follow along with the actual readings, you still have a great opportunity here to slap me around (And I’m sure I’ll continue to post on other separate topics like usual).

By the very nature of these things, there will undoubtedly be spoilers (I’ll still try to avoid them as much as I can).

And I’m going to work out a system that hides spoiler-riffic revelations from you.

Without further ado: Five Rings Annotations – Intro.