Back Up Your Book!
Let this be a lesson to you kiddies: Always back up your work!
That's right. You guessed it. The motherboard in my five year old Mac decided to hang its boots up and call it a day. I've killed it during that time, putting it through Adobe Photoshop rendering to uploading videos for Suvudu. It put its time in, of that I have no doubt.
When it died, it took most of my files with it.
Good news: I got to buy a shiny new 24' monitor G5 Mac with all the bells and whistles it could possibly come with.
Bad news: I lost some files.
For the last four days I've been trying to save those files, mostly to no avail. Sad huh? But thankfully I back up my book files a couple of times a week. I could have conceivably lost an entire year's worth of writing. But Terry, a long time ago when I began this dream, gave me a few pieces of advice and one of them was to back up, back up, back up!
You see, Terry has lost chapters, plural. Several times. He almost lost a book once but it was retrieved by the Apple people. He learned his lesson after those first few escapes, and he backs up incessantly. And prints off a hardcopy of what he's written that day. Smart man. So smart that I've tried to adopt that thinking. Although I don't print a hardcopy I do back up in four different spots. That way, if something goes wonky, I won't lose what I am working on and, therefore, have to destroy all physical matter and dark matter I see around me.
I'm finally back on track though, after NY Comic Con, three signings and the time it takes to ship those books out, and now this computer fiasco. I've almost uploaded onto my new computer all the programs I need to function. So now maybe I can finish the book!
And I am close. I'm almost finished with Chapter 31. The battle is on. It rages. Bran is doing what he can but it won't be enough. Even he knows it won't be enough. And when the chapter ends, the reader will be wondering about the fate of the Tuatha de Dannan.
Then comes a Richard chapter. And let me tell you, that Richard chapter is going to be hellfire-ishly awesome to write!
At that point, Richard's arc will be complete. And I'll have two out of three POV character arcs wrapped up.
Weird, huh?
Then a chapter, maybe two chapters, and The Dark Thorn will be finished, editing aside of course.
And just in time too, because The Long Winter is literally screaming at me to be outlined. Every day I get a great scene pop into my head or a character idea that works. It's really coming together in my head and once I get The Dark Thorn out and to New York for judgment I will start on outlining The Long Winter. It is best to be prepared if lightning strikes, right?
Saw Dan Simmons this week. Was fun. Taped his event and that will be up on Suvudu.com in a few days. Tomorrow author Ken Scholes, whose debut book Lamentation is getting great reviews, will be coming over to my place to sign several dozen books. Should be fun.
But for now, back to writing!
And that's where you should be too!
That's right. You guessed it. The motherboard in my five year old Mac decided to hang its boots up and call it a day. I've killed it during that time, putting it through Adobe Photoshop rendering to uploading videos for Suvudu. It put its time in, of that I have no doubt.
When it died, it took most of my files with it.
Good news: I got to buy a shiny new 24' monitor G5 Mac with all the bells and whistles it could possibly come with.
Bad news: I lost some files.
For the last four days I've been trying to save those files, mostly to no avail. Sad huh? But thankfully I back up my book files a couple of times a week. I could have conceivably lost an entire year's worth of writing. But Terry, a long time ago when I began this dream, gave me a few pieces of advice and one of them was to back up, back up, back up!
You see, Terry has lost chapters, plural. Several times. He almost lost a book once but it was retrieved by the Apple people. He learned his lesson after those first few escapes, and he backs up incessantly. And prints off a hardcopy of what he's written that day. Smart man. So smart that I've tried to adopt that thinking. Although I don't print a hardcopy I do back up in four different spots. That way, if something goes wonky, I won't lose what I am working on and, therefore, have to destroy all physical matter and dark matter I see around me.
I'm finally back on track though, after NY Comic Con, three signings and the time it takes to ship those books out, and now this computer fiasco. I've almost uploaded onto my new computer all the programs I need to function. So now maybe I can finish the book!
And I am close. I'm almost finished with Chapter 31. The battle is on. It rages. Bran is doing what he can but it won't be enough. Even he knows it won't be enough. And when the chapter ends, the reader will be wondering about the fate of the Tuatha de Dannan.
Then comes a Richard chapter. And let me tell you, that Richard chapter is going to be hellfire-ishly awesome to write!
At that point, Richard's arc will be complete. And I'll have two out of three POV character arcs wrapped up.
Weird, huh?
Then a chapter, maybe two chapters, and The Dark Thorn will be finished, editing aside of course.
And just in time too, because The Long Winter is literally screaming at me to be outlined. Every day I get a great scene pop into my head or a character idea that works. It's really coming together in my head and once I get The Dark Thorn out and to New York for judgment I will start on outlining The Long Winter. It is best to be prepared if lightning strikes, right?
Saw Dan Simmons this week. Was fun. Taped his event and that will be up on Suvudu.com in a few days. Tomorrow author Ken Scholes, whose debut book Lamentation is getting great reviews, will be coming over to my place to sign several dozen books. Should be fun.
But for now, back to writing!
And that's where you should be too!
Labels: The Dark Thorn, The Long Winter
posted by Shawn C. Speakman | 3:33 PM
|
8 comments
