As a little game (and because I was asked in a comment on my ‘writing excerpts blog’, which has locked entries due to various reasons, and is mostly used during the NaNoing month anyway), I also added alternative titles. These are not to be all viewed as specific scenes in the novel, nor ar they in any particular order, but they’re the kind of titles I would give if I were to compose my own soundtrack—I cannot write without music, and I’m a sucker for soundtracks, really. If you wish, feel free to toy with these and imagine what kind of scenes they could correspond to. It’s a game I like playing as well.

01 – Those Who Wanted To Stop The Fire (World of Warcraft – The Shaping of the World)
02 – Victoria (Pirates of the Caribbean OST - He’s A Pirate)
03 – Morning in Aralin (YAMANE Michiru – Castlevania: Lament of Innocence – Lost Paintings)
04 – Weaving the Energies (YAMANE Michiru – Castlevania: Lament of Innocence – House of Sacred Remains)
05 – No Witness Shall Remain (YAMANE Michiru – Castlevania: Lament of Innocence – Dark Night Toccata (Walter’s theme))
06 – The Land of a Thousand Dangers (Ancient Rites – The Return)
07 – My Life Is Thine Own (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Continually Changing Fate)
08 – A Bond That Cannot Fade (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Contract)
09 – Fighting the Shadows ~ Taeresh’s Theme (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Emiya (Kenji Kawai ver.))
10 – Only In You Can I Trust (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Inheriting the Seal)
11 – The One Who Could Not See The Sun ~ Kheril’s Theme (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Lonely Pilgrimage)
12 – Memories of the Church (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Spiritual Abyss)
13 – The Catacombs (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - The Black Cross)
14 – The Moons over the Roofs ~ Ari’s Theme (KAWAI Kenji – Fate_Stay night OST - Night of Fate)
15 – Hive Mind (Bleach OST - Nothing Can Be Explained (Vocal Ver.))
16 – A Shadow in a Land of Light ~ Tanaquil’s Theme (Full Metal Alchemist OST - Dante)
17 – The Time Has Come ~ Taellan’s Theme (Haendel – Sarabande)
18 – The Path of the Pilgrims (Narnia OST - Evacuating London)
19 – Under the Eye of God (Star Ocean 2 OST - Lose One’s Illusions)
20 – Confession (Star Ocean 3 OST - Chrysanthemum in Winter)
21 – Riding the Wave (Star Ocean 3 OST - Influence of Truth Appearance)
22 – Lurker in the Cathedral (Star Ocean 3 OST - Interval of Freezed Time)
23 – Mind Travellers (Star Ocean 3 OST - Into a Storm not Memorized)
24 – Haven (Star Ocean 3 OST - Into the Undiscovery Ocean)
25 – Negotiators ~ Marcus’ Theme (Star Ocean 3 OST - Misted Moon)
26 – A Keeper’s Nightmare ~ Iswann’s Theme (Star Ocean 3 OST - Sail Against the Wind)
27 – From the Silent Waters (Star Ocean 3 OST - So Alone, Be Sorrow)
28 – The Jewel of Ehomar (Star Ocean 3 OST - The Desolate Smell of Earth)
29 – ~ Potential End Credits ~ (Aoife Ní Fhearraigh – Metal Gear Solid OST - The Best is Yet to Come)
30 – ~ Potential End Credits Take Two ~ (Xenosaga OST - In This Serenity)

In any case, I am (re)discovering characters I thought I knew too well, my chapters make sense, my plot is slowly unveiling in front of my bewildered eyes. Even if I were to stop working on this novel right now, it would still remain a victory in my eyes. Indeed, I have absolutely no regrets about attempting NaNoWriMo again. This year, and with my mindset and the fact that I’m now well-organized in terms of schedule, it can only be a positive experience.

Yes, writing is a wonderful experience. And I really need to remind myself that no matter the lack of time, no matter the hardships of life, it is an experience that I cannot let go of. Whether I want it or not, it will always be with me, in one form or in another.

Y Tags: nanowrimo | writing

Somehow, it seemed like a good idea to do a short update now, because we’re slowly nearing November and, this year again, I have finally given in and signed up for NaNoWriMo.

I’m not going to ‘win’—I don’t think so, since I have so much school assignments and personal work to complete. I’m not going to work on a completely new idea. In fact, I’m going to start from scratch again with my one-shot project. I have no intention of letting it rot after NaNo, or of taking that as a pathetic excuse to not edit it thoroughly afterward. However, the fact is that currently, I’m not writing a lot in terms of creative works (assignment and crapping out technical manuals don’t count in that regard). I haven’t been writing much at all since I’ve moved to my new location, in fact, save for a short story aimed at a call for submission (and a second one that I didn’t send: silly me misplaced the date for the deadline). Therefore, I’m placing new hopes, so to say, in the whole NaNo hype to pump me up for a time at least, and allow me to resume a more regular rhythm of writing.

I must add that my imagination pool has not dried, nor am I growing disillusioned or uninterested in writing as a whole. It’s just that when I finally have time to write, I’m usually quite tired, or feeling guilty because I’m not using that time to do more school work or go exercise or whatnot—and then I don’t write. It sucks, and I know I have to choose my priorities, but seriously I can’t make everything a priority at this point in my life. There just aren’t enough hours in a day for that! Unfortunately, what gave was writing. In three months, though, it may be something else. Who knows.

Anyway, I’m not going to post daily NaNoWriMo updates here—I wouldn’t have the time. But I wanted to bring back some life here all the same (expect a new playlist soon, too). And I hope that with NaNo incoming, I will have a couple of things about ‘writing’ in general to say. That would be a nice change, wouldn’t it…

Y Tags: blog | nanowrimo | update | writing

Why am I mentioning this now? Simply because URLs have changed, so in case you had bookmarked a specific category or something, be aware that the link may not work any more.

I’ll of course welcome any remark about how I could improve it in the future (I’ll probably change the template, but I still need to work more on developing those skills).

Y Tags: update | website

Since there is no way I want to give up on this blog, here is one. There are just WAY too many things going on in my life at the moment for me to be able to write daily in all my blogs, and since the Y Logs are pretty much geared toward writing and writing did NOT go well in the past months, somehow it was kind of normal for me to not post here.

But don’t go running away yet! A few weeks of facing the dreaded blank page are far from enough to discourage me.

First, as I was announcing in March, one of my short stories was accepted. The three others finally weren’t, but, hey, one was! And the webzine is now out here at http://nuitsdalmor.over-blog.com/article-10920933.html (of course, the blog and ‘zine are all in French).

April was a big month of learning and revising, May was a half month of exams. Which I passed successfully. After all, it’s not every day that I can brag about getting a 18/20 at a syntax exam. I won’t even mention the ‘computer science’ exam, that was cake and a joke, and I gobbled the cake while laughing a lot.

The problems appeared after, when I found myself 1) exhausted, 2) unable to recover from those exams (and I’m still tired), 3) as a result, all the writing I had planned on doing pretty much stalled. As a result, I just said “screw it” and went to resume weight-lifting, because being so out of shape is never funny; mens sana in corpore sanao and all that.

And there is also the big move. I got very tired of living in my crappy student room, and went on the look-out for a 1-room apartment, where I could at least have a mini-kitchen AND a bathroom of my own. Talk about living la vie boheme here. Later on, the biography to be put on the back cover of my novels will probably look similar to that of a Stephen King. “This girl has lived every were and done everything save from selling a kidney to go through life”. Anyway, I will be moving in three days. Three days, and that hell hole will be behind me. Seriously, I cannot wait. It’s keeping me busy with packing and filling paperwork and running everywhere to get more paperwork to fill, but life’s good and happy.

About writing? Well, here’s a good thing as well: two weeks ago, I said “screw it again, and on top of it, I am NOT going to worry and blame myself any more”. Two days later, bam, it hit me like a brick, I got to work, and I got back into it big time. With a new short story under my belt that only needs proof- and beta-reading now. The story, not my belt. It won’t be the best short story ever, but I’m really glad to see that I still have ‘it’ in me, you see?

And this will be all for today’s update. I hope I will also have internet access soon enough after moving out, so that I can go on attempting at updating more often.

Y Tags: exams | school | studies | update | writing

I got an answer regarding one of the short stories I had submitted a few weeks ago, and it was a positive one, which will be… the first time ever for me. No need to say I’m pretty happy about it, because no matter what, whether it is in a paper anthology or in a webzine, I had never been published before (save for a couple of articles in a fanzine, but that was long ago, and it didn’t have to go through a screening process first).

I don’t know how it goes for other authors. In my case, I… didn’t sleep during that night, out of being so excited (I got the answer at 11:30 PM), then lived on a happy little cloud the day after. It’s a small step, yet one that will definitely hold much importance to my eyes. It’s also one of the short stories I’ve had the hardest time writing, because it dealt with a sort of ‘borderline’ theme that could’ve quickly fell into exaggeration, and I constantly was under the impression that I was ‘going too far’. So, I’m sort of twice as satisfied.

In any case, Yza is happy (and may now proceed to decide on a pen name at last, because she’s going to need it * chuckles *).

Y Tags: publishing | short story | submission | writing

Complicated? Yes and no. I had been hesitating for a long time, fearing that by doing so, I would only pursue new chimeras, but the facts dawned on me rather than I imposed them as a law. Either I’d get rid of a secondary plot that deserved something better than background importance (and I’d then find myself with characters without any reason of travelling any more, and with the need of modifying a general plot that otherwise suited my tastes well), or I’d develop that secondary plot, with the risk of overshadowing the main one. In the end, none of these seemed good in my book.

I need to add that said secondary plot was of the politic-diplomatic kind that deserves something else than just looking cool in the background, and, above all, that didn’t need to remain unchanged for the whole story to be consistent. However, if I were to reduce its importance, then I had to ‘justify’ it by explaining how things had come to that point. My conclusion was that another story, a one-shot, this time—a sort of prequel—would work best.

So, I indeed decided to put my trilogy aside for the time being, and to start writing this one-shot, which also be my setting of places, world and characters (well, some of them).

1) The political plot taking place in the one-shot WILL demand further diplomatic relations later on.—> My group of travelling characters therefore will keep its reason for going where they’re supposed to go. Bonus point: their problems to come won’t necessary compromise the political plot, which is good (compromising it = having to solve an extra problem = even more pages to add to the trilogy).

2) As mentioned above, this will allow me to develop some characters, and to use them later on without having to introduce them “fully” or get rid of them.—> In the trilogy, I won’t have to dwell for long on too many characters, nor to create reasons for them to avoid becoming best pals in five minutes.

3) To be honest, after having tried my hand at short stories some more, I do not want to work on a trilogy for the moment. I want to write a one-shot. Then only, if it gets published, I’ll have a lever to convince a publisher to accept a trilogy. Because, let’s be honest, there aren’t many chances to be published for a totally unknown newcomer, when said publishing houses already have to cope each months with a ton of others “young authors with their Tolkien-like fantasy trilogy”.—> Let’s start low enough to have enough chances of shining later on.

“But, dear Yza”, will you say, “do you have enough materials to write a complete novel based on a secondary plot only”?

And I’ll answer yes, because you can bet that if it weren’t the case, I wouldn’t dabble in such risky business to start with!

Y Tags: eien | novel | planning | story | writing

This afternoon, after having made sure that no typos nor spelling mistakes remained, I sent Au sein de la nuit and La Dévorante to the 5eme Saison French publishing house for their free theme. And that was… surprising. A sort of huge change in my little world.

I explain: writing, editing, sending the short story to proof-readers, applying their corrections, modifying the text hoping it’s for the best… all of this is easy. Annoying at times and leaving me with the need to rip my hair off, but easy. On the other hand, what is harder for me is to actually send the texts once I’m done with them. By doing so, I’ll now be running the risk (which is real, I admit) to see them rejected for a reason or another. I’m standing in front of failure, more than of success. And the fear of failing is something one definitely needs to triumph over. It is useless to tell oneself “I want to be published” if it’s to keep all those short stories bundled up in a drawer or on the PC, and if it’s to end up not sending the texts. (Note: I am indeed able to pull a “oh, what a shame, I had completely forgotten the deadline, now it’s too late! It’s such a shame, indeed!”)

So, it’s official: I’m ready to accept failure, and it has helped to increase my chances of getting published. Because if I don’t take part in and don’t send my stories, said chances drop to 0 anyway, right.

And even if my short stories are crappy without me realizing it, which is probably the case, at least I’ll have won something treasurable: new knowledge regarding all those little writing quirks and mistakes I should correct. (And good pals, too: the people who accepted to proof-read my stuff.)

In other words, progress came with those short stories, and I’m not afraid anymore.

Y Tags: short stories | writing

I’m thus taking a few minutes this morning to post a belated notice here, and announce that, after mulling and pondering the thought, I finally decided to put a story online—namely Unsung Heroes, which those who’ve been here since 2005 have surely heard of (a sci-fi/cyberpunk novel I had started for NaNoWriMo ‘05).

As the title easily enough reveals, it’s written in English (I just don’t have the time to translate it into French), hence I feel entitled to blab about it on the English version of the blog as well. The rest of the website is in French, though.

I’ll update accordingly in the weeks and months to follow, and don’t be surprised if I also rewrite a few bits here and there, especially if we take into account the fact that studying English in college always causes me to spot new mistakes these days. For the moment, at least, the first chapter is already available here.

(Critiques and the like are to be left on the forum or through e-mail, unfortunately: I don’t want to activate a comment system on too many pages of the website, since it seems to attract many Russian people who seemingly love football and bedroom sports a lot. Sorry about that…)

Y Tags: chapter | novel | unsung heroes | writing

Will these short stories be published? Nothing is certain here. This said, once I’ve properly proof-read them, I will send them, which will cause my chances of publication to soar through the sky—as stupid as it seems, before that, I’ve always been too shy to send anything, silly me!

I’m however resuming classes now, and will write more slowly… Nevermind, I already have caught sight of a couple more themes, and I’ll do what it takes to write some more by then.

Note: For those of you who read French, on Yzabel.net, I’ve added a page dedicated to keeping tracks of my submissions, nicely nicknamed “the rake list”. There, I’ll note down received comments, rejections, portential approvals, etc.

Y Tags: short stories | writing