For those of you who don't read every single one of my Facebook posts (it's cool; even my wife doesn't read them), here's a quick rundown of what's going on and where.
I sent Ninjas off to my agent. You probably know this. She's still reading it, but I'm naively hoping she likes it and wants to start submitting like really, really soon. Cuz getting published (and paid) would be rad.
I went to California. I spoke at my church, had meals with a quarter bazillion people, played and occasionally acquired new games, and then spent a week at inXile HQ where...
I got promoted to Torment's Design Lead. That does not mean I'm in charge of the whole thing (thank God; Colin's still Creative Lead (making sure the story, characters, writing, etc. are awesome) and Kevin's still the Project Lead (making sure the game actually gets done)). It does mean I'm in charge of the game's rules, systems, interfaces, and other designy tidbits. It's pretty much the same stuff I was doing before, except with higher expectations and less ability to blame others when things go wrong. Should be fun.
I watched like 8 movies/shows on the plane trip back. And I have determined that Disney's The Lone Ranger is stupid. BBC's Sherlock, however, is intelligently awesome.
I got home. Wherein I've played a bunch of games with the boys, given out cheap American candy, seen Catching Fire with the wife, and done very little work (except the work of getting over jet lag, which is ongoing).
Tomorrow I plan to play Wasteland 2, write >= 500 words (I've lowered my standards, for reasons), and entertain a 3-year-old tyrant. Among other things.
What have you been up to?
Status of the Update
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November 25, 2013
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Coming Up with a Book Title
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November 05, 2013
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I am preparing, finally, to send Post-Apoc Ninjas to my agent. "Post-Apoc Ninjas" is the title I use for it online, short for Post-Apocalyptic, Dragon-Riding Ninjas (with Mechs!). While that title is perfectly descriptive of what's in the book, it isn't quite the right tone for the novel.
I have another working title for the novel, which is The Con of War. It's meant to be a play on Sun Tzu's The Ancient Art of War, but (a) I don't think it really comes across and (b) it's just not cool enough. The thing is, I usually just go with whatever title comes to me. Turns out that doesn't always work (shocker!).
So instead I came up with a process (super shocker!).
STEP #1: What does a winner look like?
I thought about what the above titles were lacking in, and what I thought a good title should do. I came up with four general categories. Note that these were just my categories. You may have your own (you should probably look at titles you particularly like or something; I was too lazy):
Brainstorm. Just make up titles out of whatever. Scan or all-out read the novel looking for metaphors, themes, and cool turns of phrase. Write them all down. I ended up with twenty entrants (including the two contenders above). It helped that I was reading through the novel for a final revision and writing down anything that sounded remotely title-worthy.
STEP #3: Battle Royale. Fight!
Stick them in a table (or an Excel sheet, or Post-Its, whatever floats you) and judge them. Come up with a scale for your categories (I rated all categories from 1 to 3, because I don't need or like a lot of granularity). Try to be objective. Try to judge them without comparing one to another. Hire someone to clean up the blood and teeth afterwards.
STEP #4: Semi-Finals.
Now that all of your contestants have been judged, determine your criteria for moving on. It might be an objective look at the totals across categories. Maybe you require that one of the categories have a certain score. Maybe you give a special pass to ones you like. Copy only the winners of the Battle Royale to a new place, so you can see them against each other, without the losers cluttering them up.
My criteria was at least 8 out of a possible 12 across the categories (although a couple of 7's passed because I liked how they were used in the novel). It cut the field down from 20 to 12, which wasn't much, but when I sorted them by total, I realized that the only ones I really liked were the ones that achieved 9 and up. These three titles became my Semi-Final winners.
STEP #5: Championship.
The next thing I did kinda surprised me. Instead of choosing a winner from among the three (although I did have a favorite at this point). I looked at all three and tried to make them better.
In my case, I realized most of them were a little shy of the Tone and Feel I wanted. I clarified to myself what that feel was (mostly kung-fu), looked up a bunch of related titles (mostly kung-fu movies), and figured out what made those titles sound like they were related (basically became a human kung-fu movie title generator: Way of the Master's Deadly Dragon Fist!).
It was pretty fun.
STEP #6 (Optional): Poll Your Audience.
Because I'm nothing if not shameless (and also I think by this point most of you want to know what my finalists were). Yes, I am serious. No, I won't necessarily use the most-voted as the title. Yes, you may vote whether or not you've read the novel. (If you're reading this from e-mail or a feed reader, you'll have to click through to see the poll):
Feel free to expand upon your vote, say how stupid these are, or even suggest other titles in the comments.
I have another working title for the novel, which is The Con of War. It's meant to be a play on Sun Tzu's The Ancient Art of War, but (a) I don't think it really comes across and (b) it's just not cool enough. The thing is, I usually just go with whatever title comes to me. Turns out that doesn't always work (shocker!).
So instead I came up with a process (super shocker!).
STEP #1: What does a winner look like?
I thought about what the above titles were lacking in, and what I thought a good title should do. I came up with four general categories. Note that these were just my categories. You may have your own (you should probably look at titles you particularly like or something; I was too lazy):
- Tone and Feel: A measure of how well the title hints at what is to come. For my novel, this meant as many of the following as possible: an Asian feel, ninjas, dragons, mechs, post-apocalyptic setting, con game, and war.
- Multiple Meanings: A measure of how many ways the title can be interpreted (the more, the better), and the relevance of those interpretations to the novel.
- Use in the Novel: A measure of whether the title is a phrase from the prose itself and how relevant that phrase is to the novel's theme(s). Is it an important phrase? Repeated? Does it have special meaning, or is it a throwaway term?
- Overall Coolness: A measure of how cool the title might sound to someone who knows absolutely nothing about the story.
Brainstorm. Just make up titles out of whatever. Scan or all-out read the novel looking for metaphors, themes, and cool turns of phrase. Write them all down. I ended up with twenty entrants (including the two contenders above). It helped that I was reading through the novel for a final revision and writing down anything that sounded remotely title-worthy.
STEP #3: Battle Royale. Fight!
Stick them in a table (or an Excel sheet, or Post-Its, whatever floats you) and judge them. Come up with a scale for your categories (I rated all categories from 1 to 3, because I don't need or like a lot of granularity). Try to be objective. Try to judge them without comparing one to another. Hire someone to clean up the blood and teeth afterwards.
STEP #4: Semi-Finals.
Now that all of your contestants have been judged, determine your criteria for moving on. It might be an objective look at the totals across categories. Maybe you require that one of the categories have a certain score. Maybe you give a special pass to ones you like. Copy only the winners of the Battle Royale to a new place, so you can see them against each other, without the losers cluttering them up.
My criteria was at least 8 out of a possible 12 across the categories (although a couple of 7's passed because I liked how they were used in the novel). It cut the field down from 20 to 12, which wasn't much, but when I sorted them by total, I realized that the only ones I really liked were the ones that achieved 9 and up. These three titles became my Semi-Final winners.
STEP #5: Championship.
The next thing I did kinda surprised me. Instead of choosing a winner from among the three (although I did have a favorite at this point). I looked at all three and tried to make them better.
In my case, I realized most of them were a little shy of the Tone and Feel I wanted. I clarified to myself what that feel was (mostly kung-fu), looked up a bunch of related titles (mostly kung-fu movies), and figured out what made those titles sound like they were related (basically became a human kung-fu movie title generator: Way of the Master's Deadly Dragon Fist!).
It was pretty fun.
STEP #6 (Optional): Poll Your Audience.
Because I'm nothing if not shameless (and also I think by this point most of you want to know what my finalists were). Yes, I am serious. No, I won't necessarily use the most-voted as the title. Yes, you may vote whether or not you've read the novel. (If you're reading this from e-mail or a feed reader, you'll have to click through to see the poll):
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Inspiration
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October 25, 2013
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My Boys' First RPG
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October 23, 2013
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comments)
I've been wanting to try my boys out on an RPG for a while now, but I wasn't really sure how. I'd given away a lot of my sourcebooks, so all I had left was the d20 SRD which, while great, wasn't quite what I wanted.
Then I got this fancy schmancy Numenera corebook in the mail. This system is what I wanted: simple, flexible, and with a heck of a lot of leeway for a GM who wasn't sure how well his players would get things. But the Ninth World can be kinda . . . creepy, at least for 6- and 7-year-olds. I wanted something they could be excited about.
"Why don't you just make something up?" said my wife, ever supportive of even my geekliest dilemmas.
"Are you kidding?" I said. "Do you know how much work that would take? Even if I adapted what I have, I'd still have to make up a bunch of equipment and powers. Though the types would be pretty easy to adapt, I guess. Most of the esoteries are basically Force powers anyway. And the descriptors work okay. . ."
And then I couldn't stop thinking about it.
The next couple of days looked like this:
Now all I have to do is figure out the rules for lightsabers before they earn theirs. . .
Then I got this fancy schmancy Numenera corebook in the mail. This system is what I wanted: simple, flexible, and with a heck of a lot of leeway for a GM who wasn't sure how well his players would get things. But the Ninth World can be kinda . . . creepy, at least for 6- and 7-year-olds. I wanted something they could be excited about.
"Why don't you just make something up?" said my wife, ever supportive of even my geekliest dilemmas.
"Are you kidding?" I said. "Do you know how much work that would take? Even if I adapted what I have, I'd still have to make up a bunch of equipment and powers. Though the types would be pretty easy to adapt, I guess. Most of the esoteries are basically Force powers anyway. And the descriptors work okay. . ."
And then I couldn't stop thinking about it.
I MAY have accidentally spent yesterday adapting @MonteJCook's Numenera to the Star Wars universe...
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 21, 2013
The next couple of days looked like this:
Sam, Nathan, and Isaac are busy drawing and writing stories for their Star Wars characters. I'm so proud.
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 21, 2013
Nathan's Numenera/Star Wars character is a Clever Ewok Hot Shot who Controls Gravity.
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 21, 2013
This campaign I started with my boys is not going to be Star Wars canon. Just throwing that out there right now.
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 21, 2013
When asked, all five boys independently said they wanted a lightsaber as their weapon. #shouldhaveseenthatcoming #StarWarsRPG
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 21, 2013
"Master Luke says you need to take a 2-day journey to a sacred pool. What do you do?" Nathan: "I fight all the Jedi." #SWRPGfirstday
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 22, 2013
Isaac: "I want to jump up a tree and throw my knife at the Drakken." "You can try. Roll to see--" *Isaac rolls two 20's* #SWRPGfirstday
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 22, 2013
"No, you already recovered. You can't recover more points until after the fight is over." Sam: "Oh. Can I be done now?" #SWRPGfirstday
— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 22, 2013
Now all I have to do is figure out the rules for lightsabers before they earn theirs. . .
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Loving What You Write
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October 15, 2013
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I've had a hard time writing lately. Oh don't worry, there's still a novel on sub, and another novel ready to go after that one. This page is still up to date (wait, is it up to date? . . . Yes, now it's up to date).
What's been hard is writing something new. Part of that has been RPG crafting systems and dialogue design (who knew two full-time jobs would be so much work, am I right?). Part of it is in that first paragraph: I'm on sub, have another ready to go, and my brain is saying, "Why are you writing more?"
BUT I've figured out something that makes it hard to write no matter how many jobs or kids I have: I'm bored of the book.
It sucks, I know, but it has two very easy fixes:
I read ahead in my outline until I hit a scene I was excited about. Once I remembered the cool thing I was working toward, it gave me motivation and ideas for how to get there. SO much better than thinking, "Okay, now I have to write a scene where he goes to school again . . ."
(Obviously if you're Zuko-ing it, you won't have an outline, but you have notes, right? Ideas? You can at least think ahead even if you can't read ahead).
World-building. You may know I love me some world-building. A lot of times when I'm bored it's because the world is boring. So I fix that and add something cool. Like mechs or displacer beasts.
I made up some slang. This is part of world-building, but it's become such a fundamental part of my process (and it was such a fundamental part of me getting unstuck today) that it deserves its own paragraph. I HEART SLANG. I came up with six new words and a system unique to this world for just a couple of pages (which, for you math-minded, means that about 1% of the words on those pages are completely made up).
If those don't work for you, then maybe it's the characters, maybe you need to know what they want or fear. Maybe you need to talk to yourself about the story a while, or maybe you just need to get out.
The important thing is that if you're bored with the story, your readers probably will be too. Find what you love and fill the story with that.
What's been hard is writing something new. Part of that has been RPG crafting systems and dialogue design (who knew two full-time jobs would be so much work, am I right?). Part of it is in that first paragraph: I'm on sub, have another ready to go, and my brain is saying, "Why are you writing more?"
BUT I've figured out something that makes it hard to write no matter how many jobs or kids I have: I'm bored of the book.
It sucks, I know, but it has two very easy fixes:
- Find what you love about the book (you did love something, right?) and do that.
- If all you're left with is things you don't love, fix them until you do.
I read ahead in my outline until I hit a scene I was excited about. Once I remembered the cool thing I was working toward, it gave me motivation and ideas for how to get there. SO much better than thinking, "Okay, now I have to write a scene where he goes to school again . . ."
(Obviously if you're Zuko-ing it, you won't have an outline, but you have notes, right? Ideas? You can at least think ahead even if you can't read ahead).
World-building. You may know I love me some world-building. A lot of times when I'm bored it's because the world is boring. So I fix that and add something cool. Like mechs or displacer beasts.
I made up some slang. This is part of world-building, but it's become such a fundamental part of my process (and it was such a fundamental part of me getting unstuck today) that it deserves its own paragraph. I HEART SLANG. I came up with six new words and a system unique to this world for just a couple of pages (which, for you math-minded, means that about 1% of the words on those pages are completely made up).
If those don't work for you, then maybe it's the characters, maybe you need to know what they want or fear. Maybe you need to talk to yourself about the story a while, or maybe you just need to get out.
The important thing is that if you're bored with the story, your readers probably will be too. Find what you love and fill the story with that.
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Fact: NYC Has an Airship Dock
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August 30, 2013
(11
comments)
A friend of mine visited New York City recently and sent me this very important information along with photo evidence.
Apparently the only reason it was never used was due to high wind speeds at that height.
Such a freaking shame. We were just a few gusts away from a steampunk utopia.
"The top section of the Empire State Building, including the spire, was actually designed to allow dirigibles to dock at the building and passengers to disembark at the top. The interior of the spire has a massive winch installed where a drag line from the blimp could be attached and reeled in, then a small walkway would be extended to the bridge of the ship."
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"Do you credit a Most High God?"
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August 08, 2013
(15
comments)
John Scalzi recently described himself as "an agnostic of the 'I'm almost certain God does not exist, but
intellectual honesty requires me to admit I just don’t know' stripe." That's a belief I have a lot of respect for.
I'm both similar and opposite (yes, I can be both). I'm certain God exists and cares for us, but intellectual honesty requires me to admit I could be wrong.
I said I have a lot of respect for beliefs like Scalzi's, and that's because there isn't proof of a God -- not in the way we want there to be. If there were, the internet would have a lot less to argue about. And so of course I struggle with my own belief.
I'm certain God exists; I wouldn't be out here, doing what I'm doing, if I thought He didn't -- I'm just not that good. But why am I so certain? That's harder to quantify, and certainly I can't do it in a way that would irrefutably convince an atheist I am right.
But I don't believe blindly. As I said, I struggle constantly. I question why I believe what I do, and why others believe what they do. I question every word I teach my kids, refusing to teach the Sunday School lessons I was given unless I believe them myself. I frequently answer their questions with, "I don't know." I teach them what other people believe. Most importantly, I teach them that I won't ever make them follow God, that they have to make that choice for themselves.
To the point of this post, sci-fi/fantasy is usually so unabashedly atheistic, that I am always surprised -- quite pleasantly -- when it speaks directly to my own heart struggles. The passage below is from SFWA Grand Master Gene Wolfe's The Wizard. Sir Able, the narrator, is a knight more noble than any I have ever read about, who wrestles daily with what it means to be good and honorable. The sister of the king meets him in secret on an unrelated matter, but during the conversation, she asks him if he believes in God.
I'm sure it won't hit you the way it hit me, but I have to share it anyway, because I see a lot of truth in Sir Able's answer:
I'm both similar and opposite (yes, I can be both). I'm certain God exists and cares for us, but intellectual honesty requires me to admit I could be wrong.
I said I have a lot of respect for beliefs like Scalzi's, and that's because there isn't proof of a God -- not in the way we want there to be. If there were, the internet would have a lot less to argue about. And so of course I struggle with my own belief.
I'm certain God exists; I wouldn't be out here, doing what I'm doing, if I thought He didn't -- I'm just not that good. But why am I so certain? That's harder to quantify, and certainly I can't do it in a way that would irrefutably convince an atheist I am right.
But I don't believe blindly. As I said, I struggle constantly. I question why I believe what I do, and why others believe what they do. I question every word I teach my kids, refusing to teach the Sunday School lessons I was given unless I believe them myself. I frequently answer their questions with, "I don't know." I teach them what other people believe. Most importantly, I teach them that I won't ever make them follow God, that they have to make that choice for themselves.
To the point of this post, sci-fi/fantasy is usually so unabashedly atheistic, that I am always surprised -- quite pleasantly -- when it speaks directly to my own heart struggles. The passage below is from SFWA Grand Master Gene Wolfe's The Wizard. Sir Able, the narrator, is a knight more noble than any I have ever read about, who wrestles daily with what it means to be good and honorable. The sister of the king meets him in secret on an unrelated matter, but during the conversation, she asks him if he believes in God.
I'm sure it won't hit you the way it hit me, but I have to share it anyway, because I see a lot of truth in Sir Able's answer:
"Do you credit a Most High God?"
The question caught me by surprise. I said, "Why of course," stammering like the boy I pretended not to be.
"I do and don't." She smiled, and the smile became her laugh. It was music, but I never ached to hear it again as I did Disiri's. Even then, I thought her less than human, and that laugh was at the root of my opinion.
"I don't and I do." She cocked her head like a bird.
I bowed again. "Just so, My Lady. We can think only of creatures, of things He's made. Creatures are all we know, and can be all we know until we know Him. When we think of Him like that, we find we can't believe. He can't be like a creature any more than a carpenter is like a table."
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