Adam Christopher | Steampunk and dark fantasy author. Now with added superheroes!
Adam Christopher is a New Zealand-born SF writer living in the sunny north of England.Archive for August, 2009
Writing Habits #6 -J.C. Hutchins
For those of us familiar with the world of podcast fiction, today’s writer in the hot seat needs no introduction. J. C. Hutchins kick-started the podcast novel revolution in 2006 with 7th Son, a serialised technothriller trilogy dealing the aftermath of the US President’s assassination… by a four-year-old child. While it started life as a podcast novel, the award-winning 7th Son was optioned for development as a feature film by Warner Bros in April this year, and will be released as a print novel trilogy by St. Martin’s Press, starting with 7th Son: Descent in October 2009.
The Hutch’s latest project is a mind-blowing interactive, multimedia, immersive supernatural thriller novel Personal Effects: Dark Art. This book comes with actual physical objects – driver’s licences, credit cards, psychiatric hospital certificates, and much more – that link the reader with the events of the story, and seeded through the book itself are phone numbers and websites which are real and can be called and visited. This engaging and exciting project is the result of a collaboration between Hutchins and game designer Jordan Weisman, and was published by St. Martin’s Press in June 2009. Hutchins has followed this with a Personal Effects: Sword of Blood, a free podcast prequel novella.
On top of all this, Hutchins is a champion of social media and an all-round top bloke. He’s also a frightening creative power, his friendly, charming exterior belying the horrific and twisted stories he delights in telling us with a childlike glee. An evil, evil, childlike glee. If you want further proof of his secret powers and not-so-secret genius, Hutchins teamed up with alt-culture and pin-up site Suicide Girls to create a Personal Effects-themed photoshoot. Suicide Girls is not safe for work and is adults-only, but a PG-13-rated photoset can be downloaded from JCHutchins.net. See? A genius. I wish I’d thought of that first…
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr J. C. Hutchins.
Podcasting's Mr Nice, J. C. Hutchins
Name
J.C. Hutchins
Location
Fort Lauderdale, Florida, United States
What do you write?
I write novels – technothrillers and supernatural/horror thrillers. I’m a lover of Crichton and King, and their inspiration and influence show up in my work. I also take great joy in crafting short stories, though I don’t write them as often as I probably should.
The interactive novel experience, Personal Effects: Dark Art
What are your writing habits?
Since I’m often spread pretty thin with my new media projects – twice- or thrice-weekly podcasts, promotion of my novel, social media outreach including twitter, pitches and answering emails – and a day gig, I consider myself a “binge writer.” I’ll go weeks without writing a word, and then dive head-first into a project.
When I’m writing, caffeine is omnipresent – and when I’m not chain-smoking on the balcony, typing away, I’m usually blasting music. Scene/mood-appropriate instrumental tunes, mostly. I aim for 4,000 words each day, and can go as high as 7,000 when I’m in the zone.
Juggling the mission-critical necessities of promotion and content creation bedevils me. It’s an intense workload, but I’m hungry to carve new paths in online fiction and published fiction. The effort is worth it.
7th Son: Descent, coming October 2009 from St. Martin's Press
What software or tools do you use?
For brainstorming, it’s good old fashioned pen and paper. I love the organic process of unearthing plot twists and character traits on the page. My notes are a flurry of arrows pointing from one bullet list to another… and lots of question marks. I find asking myself questions stimulates my mind to find answers… which begets more bullet points, arrows and question marks. It’s a blast.
These days, I craft my fiction using the Macintosh program Pages. It’s a very elegant word processor that gets out of the way and lets you type… but has the whiz-bang formatting tools I sometimes need. It also has a very powerful page design feature, which is very useful for me, since I create a lot of my own promotional materials.
For my new media projects, I use Garageband to record and edit my podcasts, Photoshop for graphic design, iMovie for video editing, and WordPress and TextWrangler for website management. I have a handful of other apps that I use for niche projects, but those are the biggies.
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J. C. Hutchins, thank-you very much!
J. C. can be found online on at JCHutchins.net and on Twitter as @jchutchins. Personal Effects: Dark Art is available on Amazon.com and at all good bookstores – if your local store doesn’t have a copy, ask them to order it! The prequel audio novella, Personal Effects: Sword of Blood, can be downloaded for free at SwordOfBlood.com. 7th Son: Descent drops on October 27th, and is available for pre-order at Amazon.com. For those who can’t wait, the entire 7th Son trilogy can still be downloaded, for free, from 7thSonNovel.com. A brand new recording of the print version of 7th Son is coming later in 2009, so stay tuned for that!
Friday
What? Friday already? Say it ain’t so… apologies for the lack of postage this week, it’s been busy. I might as well see if I can get a whole set of seven posts with a day of the week as the title, so welcome to Friday.
There’s not actually much to report on my front this week – my superhero novel Seven Wonders hit 102,000 words this morning. Although I’m not done, it was still a buzz to cross the 100k mark. I can remember when I did it with my first novel, Dark Heart. The feeling was rather exhilirating, because if nothing else I at least proved to myself that I could write a novel-length work of fiction. Dark Heart ended at about 124,000 words. I think Seven Wonders will be about the same, and I’ve given myself until next Monday to finish it up. Then I’ll print up a trade paperback on Lulu as a personal edit copy and stick it on the shelf for a few months while I take down the ominous black tome that is Dark Heart and get cracking on the second draft. That’s September taken care of. Then once Dark Heart is edited/redrafted, I’ll be starting its sequel in October. I honestly can’t wait to get started, not only because it’s a story I’ve had outlined and plotted for literally years, but because the title popped into my head a few weeks ago, and every time I say it, I positively tingle with anticipation. That title is Dreamweapon. You heard it here first, folks. Tell your friends, tell your family. And yes, it is the name of an album by Spacemen 3. Talent borrows, genius frickn’ steals.
My personal week may have been unremarkable, but not so in the world of teh awesome writers and publishers. Our FDO Scott Sigler, whom I interviewed for a special Writing Habits podcast episode the other week, is now busy signing, numbering, and shipping the initial batch of The Rookie from his secret Warehouse of Doom in San Francisco. The book looks terrific – check out Scott’s own personal unboxing video here. Incidentally, my interview with Scott can still be found on iTunes, and for those who have been asking for it, you can download the original mp3 of the podcast here.
The Rookie also represents the first book from Dark Overlord Media, a new venture officially launched by Scott and business partner A Kovacs. The full press release can be found here, but suffice to say, publishing will never be the same again.
Two words. “Kick” and “Ass”.
The Devil in Chains [remastered]
Following the excellent example of fellow writer of the dark and scary Jennifer Williams, I’ve tweaked and reformatted The Devil in Chains, my steampunk novella and prequel to Dark Heart, and am pleased to announce an improved PDF version, as well as formats for other devices such as ePub, etc. You can get these on Smashwords, which has the advantage of an online catalogue accessible directly from Stanza on the iPhone and iPod touch. Stanza is completely free, and I highly recommend it as an eReader application.
Additionally, the definitive PDF version can be downloaded here. This version differs slightly in format to the Smashwords version, as the latter required some special tweaks to get the text working in ePub format. I’d recommend this as the best version, with Smashwords useful for reading on the move.
Formatting for different eBook formats is fun but fiddly – please feel free to report any bugs, problems, mistakes or issues to me, and I’ll fix them as I can.
The Devil in Chains is also available as an eBook for the iPhone/iPod touch at the iTunes app store.
Thursday
It’s Thursday, that time of the week that (like Arthur Dent) I could never get the hang of, so I’ll keep it brief. I’ll even itemise things.
The Devil in Chains
Somebody added my 2008 novella to Good Reads (although apparently it doesn’t recognise the cover), and even reviewed it! I’m rather flattered, and quite frankly to have someone tell me that in one scene,
An ordinary exploration of an empty room suddenly becomes an exercise in exquisite grotesquerie.
… makes me all sorts of happy inside.
What also makes my head spin is a review in the form of a Shakespearean sonnet. This goes beyond flattery and into the surreal realms of honour. I think a w00t is called for. Thanks to Kate for her devotion to the cause!
Speaking of The Devil in Chains, I need to get cracking on reformatting the PDF properly for the Sony eBook reader. This website will also undergo a bit of a redesign when Seven Wonders is done, which will make it easier to keep track of projects and also easier for people to find stuff to read. For the moment, you can grab The Devil in Chains here as a PDF, or here as an eBook for the iPhone/iPod touch.
Seven Wonders
The book that never ends! Actually that sounds a bit harsh. The draft of this superhero novel is at about 95,000 words, and I’m slowly in-filling the middle bit. I’m giving myself to the end of August for this, and I think I’m on track. It’s actually a lot of fun writing about Tony and Jeannie and Sam and Joe and SMART, as not only do I know what happens to them at the end, I’ve already written it. Going back in time a few weeks and seeing what they were up to before everything went wrong is really interesting as a writer.
Master project list
Something else for the website is a proper tracker of projects, but I’ve yet to find the right funky progress bar widget. However, having discovered the wonder of VoodooPad (basically your own personal off-line wiki), I’ve started transferring dozens of separate documents of notes and ideas into one repository, which means I’ve also created a master index of novels, plotting out a sort of schedule well into 2010 and beyond. VoodooPad is a work of genius, and now joins Scrivener on my list of essential writing tools.
Which means nothing until I actually show you guys something, but it did surprise me (pleasantly, I should add), that I’ve got no fewer than 11 novels planned so far. Which is good, because to make it as a writer you need, firstly, to keep writing and writing and writing, and then when hopefully something is picked up, if you want to make a living out of it you have to be working on the next book, and then the next, and then the next.
So a list of 11 books is easy. It’s just a list and a few notes for each. Ideas are cheap and the imagination is limitless. Sitting down and writing is hard, but at least I know where I am aiming.
Writing Habits #5 – Scott Sigler special edition!
As if you didn’t know it, Scott Sigler is a New York Times Bestselling author, the king of podcast novels, and our Future Dark Overlord. He’s also a real gent, and his limited edition hardcover of The Rookie is due to ship at the end of the month. Just look at the blurb and pick your jaw up off the floor when you’re done:
Set in a lethal pro football league 700 years in the future, THE ROOKIE is a story that combines the intense gridiron action of “Any Given Sunday” with the space opera style of “Star Wars” and the criminal underworld of “The Godfather.”
Aliens and humans alike play positions based on physiology, creating receivers that jump 25 feet into the air, linemen that bench-press 1,200 pounds, and linebackers that literally want to eat you. Organized crime runs every franchise, games are fixed and rival players are assassinated.
Follow the story of Quentin Barnes, a 19-year-old quarterback prodigy that has been raised all his life to hate, and kill, those aliens. Quentin must deal with his racism and learn to lead, or he’ll wind up just another stat in the column marked “killed on the field.”
So to prep y’all for this rather exciting event, I spoke to Scott about The Rookie’s journey from podcast to print, his five-book deal with Crown Publishing, and his writing habits. Thanks to my good friends at the Box Room podcast, this special Writing Habits episode is available at their forum here. It’s also up on iTunes as a free podcast here – hit the subscribe button, and when I get around to going more audio interviews you’ll get them straight away.
The FDO himself, Scott Sigler
Scott Sigler himself can be found at scottsigler.com, on Facebook at facebook.com/scottsigler, and on Twitter as @scottsigler. You can order his books from Amazon and all good bookstores, apart from The Rookie which is exclusive to his website, for reasons which he explains in the interview.
I hope you enjoy the interview. I’d love to hear your feedback, so please post in the comments below!
The end is the beginning is the end
Seven Wonders is finished.
Oh yes. The bad guy got what was coming, the good guys got what was coming. There was a meeting on the moon, there was an attack on the city. There was one mother of a finale, with the superheroes of the world uniting in high orbit to defend the planet against an alien attack. Exciting and action-packed, I hope.
Except it’s not finished. The final chapter has been written, the last sentence typed. The story is complete and plot threads resolved.
Except for the middle bit of the book, which I skipped.
Now, I had my reasons. Seven Wonders was pretty difficult to get started. Although I’m a fan of and familiar with the superhero genre, it’s a new one to write in for me, and getting it right is tricky. It has to be serious but not po-faced, with all the capes and spandex and X-ray vision of comics, but without descending into parody or silliness. I cracked it in the end, and the second half of Seven Wonders really took off.
But in order to make the jump and get things rolling, I had to call it quits on the earlier part of the book. I’ve called it “Act II” on Twitter, but really it’s the second half of Act I. There is a big transition to make between all of my characters making their independent discoveries at the beginning of the book, to the giant battles at the end. This bit is really integral, the whole reason for writing the book in the first place, the whole high concept thing. I stopped writing it because I didn’t know the characters well enough, and wasn’t happy with what they were doing. What I had written turned into a series of independent events with no apparent arc or theme. So I stopped, knowing that I would return at the end and add all this in. Now that I know what becomes of the characters in the story – sometimes diverging from my original outline by quite a margin – I can go back, plant the seeds, build the arc, and push everyone where they need to go. Aceness. Currently the manuscript is at 89,284 words, which gives me just over 10k to fill in.
And then I sat down to do some outlining of this Act I.5, and it’s so long I think I’m going to need, oh, 50k to fit it all on. Well, hot dang.
As with my first novel, Dark Heart, the target wordcount is 100,000, for various reasons I have mentioned in the past, but mainly because for a first novel from an unpublished author, 99.99%-recurring agents won’t touch anything longer. While this doesn’t influence my writing to a significant extent – a story is as long as it needs to be – it is something I try and keep track of. Dark Heart ended up as 126,000-something, which means it’ll need trimming in the second draft. The second draft that I’m supposed to be working on now, in August, while the completed vomit draft of Seven Wonders sits on the shelf in as fancy Lulu POD’ed trade paperback editing copy.
But it looks – maybe – that Seven Wonders is going to be longer, possibly much longer. Well, fine. The first draft is the first draft is the first draft. As Scott Sigler said (more on my interview with him later!), you’ve gotta get that clay on the wheel. So Seven Wonders is going to be a long one, and will need maybe another month to finish up.
What does that mean? Absolutely nothing, really, except I’m a list-maker and a box-checker, and had the rest of 2009 mapped out, writing-wise. Now that schedule is out by a month, which considering the glacial pace of writing and publishing in general, is nothing major. But one frustration is seeing steampunk increase in popularity almost daily, and I’ve got a cracking steampunk series that begins with Dark Heart, a novel that is in need of rewriting before I can even begin to think of shopping it around.
But that’s just me. Steampunk won’t go away. If anything, it’ll be even more popular in 2010, looking at forthcoming books, films and TV shows.
So what do I do? I write, and keep writing, and do my damnedest to make Seven Wonders completely awesome, even if it is 150,000 words long.
Time to put some new dates on the wall planner.
Writing Habits #4 – Seth Harwood
California-based crime novelist Seth Harwood is another podcasting success story. Having introduced his high-octane detective thriller stylee to the podsphere in 2006, in May 2009, the first volume of the Jack Palms series, Jack Wakes Up, was released by Three Rivers Press. Good crime fiction is hard to write, but Seth is on top of the game. I can’t really beat Scott Sigler’s summary of the book, when he said: “Jack Wakes Up is like a Tarantino film pulled off the screen, rolled in a John Woo zig-zag wrapper and sparked up with a vintage Miami Vice lighter. Buy it now and thank me later.”
Wise words. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr Seth Harwood.
Name
Seth Harwood, aka the Palms Father of Soul, The James Brown of Podcasting
Location
California, USA – the Berkeley Hills
What do you write?
I write crime novels in the Jack Palms series and literary short stories… so far. Who knows what I’ll get into next? More crime, definitely more crime!
Jack Wakes Up: A Novel, by Seth Harwood
What are your writing habits?
I write first thing or as close to first thing in the morning as possible. The sooner I can get from bed to keys, the better it seems to flow. I’ll go through periods where, honestly, all I do is work on promotion of my work. That can take the form of podcasting, blogging, interacting with fans online, and building in new media. Fortunately there are times I get excited about this so it’s not a grind.
Then there are the writing drafting times. When I’m in this mode, I’ll avoid the internet altogether until I’ve done my word count for the day. I usually set a goal of however many words (1,000 when I’m starting out and then 1,500 and 2,000 or above when I’m really into a project.) But I try not to overdo it. I’m a big believer in feeling out your limits and not going beyond. That’s how I think people get “blocked.” I’ll try to write as many days a week as I can, but usually not more than 6. Every day I make sure to stop at a point where I know what’s going to happen next; this makes starting up the next day a lot easier.
I don’t write with an outline. I like getting to know the characters and their situations as I go. If I’m getting surprised, it usually amounts to good writing, exciting for the reader. I believe in writing each sentence as best I can, and letting that one lead me on to the next. Then in revision I try to find out what I learned about the story along the way, then try to build that in from the start.
What software or tools do you use?
I use Scrivener for writing my novels and a MacBook. I used to use Word, but literally I can’t imagine how I’d write a novel without Scrivener now. I guess that’d make me do outlines – outline as I go. There’s nothing that can match Scrivener’s chapter view for seeing where the book has gone and is going. I title my chapters so I know a bit about what happens in each one and just look back at that list as my outline. I can also jump right to the parts I need to see with it, instead of massive scrolling and reading movements like I had to do in Word. Blech!
If you’ve got a Mac and want to write a novel, you’ve got to get Scrivener!
I also use 3″ x 5″ notecards. I jot stuff down on them all the time, like crazy. Stick them wherever I can.
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Seth Harwood, thank-you very much! Seth can be found online at his website, sethharwood.com, and also on Facebook at facebook.com/sethharwood and twitter as @sethharwood. The Jack Palms series of podcast novels can be downloaded for free from Seth’s website, and the original podcast novel version of Jack Wakes Up is also available for free from iTunes, while the print version can be found at Amazon.com and your local bookstore.
Take Scott’s advice and buy several copies today.
