story: path to the peacock throne – Page 2

Tag: story: path to the peacock throne (page 2 of 2)

Fiction Fridays: Writing Soundtracks, the NaNoWriMo Edition

For today’s first edition of Fiction Fridays, I planned to write a bit about the music that is the inspiration for my NaNoWriMo novel. Coincidentally, the theme for Week 2 of the Warm Fuzzies blogfest is to share something that inspires our current WIPs, so I can kill two birds with one stone.

Having a soundtrack tailored to each WIP is incredibly important to me. Music fuels my mood as a writer, and it also helps me tap into the emotional tone that I want to evoke in my work. I spend far too much time pulling my playlists together — and yes, that is multiple playlists. I usually have a list for the WIP as a whole, plus songs tailored for individual characters, songs that reflect friendships and romances, and songs that inspire specific plot points and scenes (you know, battle scenes, sad moments, sappy moments).

Utilizing a musical soundtrack is also incredibly helpful when it comes to transitioning between projects. TELL ME NO LIES, the novel I most recently worked on (a steampunk murder mystery/romance), has a very distinctive vibe, with lots of folk and country music that remind me of 19th century San Francisco. Disentangling myself from that world and the incredibly vocal characters that inhabit it is a difficult process, but using music to ease that shift makes things a bit easier.

I’ve culled through the current playlist to find the three songs that I think are the most representative of the mood and tone of this novel. As per the rules for this week’s Warm Fuzzies challenge, I’m not going to tell you what the novel is about. Based on the songs I post, you get to guess exactly what this tale might be about. And I see you there, about to peek at my works in-progress page (I’m shaking a finger in admonition, I hope you know). We’re going for honest guesses, folks, so no cheating. 😀

Cara Dillon, “Black is the Colour” (Lyrics)

Cara Dillon is a contemporary Irish folk singer, and her ethereal voice always sends shivers down my spine. She released four studio albums between 2001 and 2009, all of which include a blend of traditional Irish ballads and original music. “Black is the Colour” comes from Cara Dillon, her first album.

Lisa Gerrard, “Sanvean”

Lisa Gerrard is an Australian singer, and former member of the band Dead Can Dance. If her voice sounds familiar, it may be because you recognize it from the Gladiator soundtrack, which she co-composed with Hans Zimmer (“Now We Are Free” is one of her most popular tracks from that album). If you’re wondering exactly what language she’s speaking in “Sanvean,” it turns out that she’s using an invented tongue, one that she created as a child to “talk to God.” She has employed it in a number of her songs over the years.

Loreena McKennitt, “The Old Ways” (Lyrics)

Loreena McKennitt is one of my all-time favorite singers. Her music is lush, evocative, and intricate, and always feels somewhat magical to me. She draws from a wide range of inspiration, from European literature (including Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott” and Noyes’ “The Highwayman“) and traditional Celtic music, to broader Arabic and Mediterranean influences. McKennitt is an accomplished singer, songwriter, and musician. “The Old Ways” comes from her fourth album, The Visit.

And there we have it! Any inspired guesses about what my current WIP might be about?

As a sort of “preview of coming attractions,” I’ll be sharing more about the details of my project in my Sunday check-in for the A Round of Words in 80 Days writing challenge. Also, I’m cohosting a discussion about NaNoWriMo progress in today’s post over at Fun Not Fear! All WriMos are invited to pop over and chat about how the first few days of NaNo has gone; for those of you who aren’t participating, we can always use cheerleaders, so please feel free to stop by and say hello.

ROW80: Wrapping Up Round 3

September 22, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 9 Comments

With my mom in town and school starting back today, it’s been a busy few days since our last check-in. Mom and I have been out every day except for Wednesday, I’ve been doing a ton of driving for all of our adventuring, and I had a major case of the freak-outs yesterday, when I saw the syllabus for one of my classes (so many books and articles, I think my eyeballs will roll out of my head by December). I calmed myself down by remembering that this really isn’t anything new, but yikes, it was definitely a scary moment.

But onto fun things! Today marks the end of ROW80’s Round 3, and it is both an exhilarating and bittersweet feeling. Reflecting on Round 3, I’ve come to appreciate all the more the length and nature of this writing challenge. Having 80 days to work towards a set of goals, and being encouraged to be flexible with them if necessary, has been exactly what I’ve needed.

These were my initial goals for Round 3 (I actually had to look them up, because I changed them more than once, and forgot what the original ones were):

Write an average of 500 words/day on any project. This means that I’m doubling my Round 2 word count goal, which makes me slightly nervous, but we’ll see how it goes! I found myself exceeding the original 250 words/day goal consistently, so I don’t think this increase will be too burdensome.

Complete Act 2 of Path to the Peacock Throne, and resist the urge to do too much editing to Act 1.

Move from brainstorming and world-building tell me no lies to working on the first draft.

I ended up exceeding the daily word count quite a bit when I tackled CampNaNo in August. While I didn’t complete Act 2 of PATH TO THE PEACOCK THRONE, I did write over 50k for TELL ME NO LIES, which was a feat in and of itself. I also wrote roughly 13K for STRANGE BEDFELLOWS, although I’ve placed that on the back-burner for the moment.

I had a few other goals for the summer, in particular finishing the 1st draft of my MA thesis. I haven’t finalized the draft, but I did manage to write over 12.5K, retool the theoretical framework, and outline the remainder of the “results” section. I was feeling a little down about not having everything finished and wrapped up. However, I ran into my advisor at the grocery store the other day (oh, the perils of going to school in a small town), who told me to “take my time” finalizing the project. Definitely lifts a little of the pressure off my shoulders, though I do have my own timeline (defending by December?) that I’d like to maintain.

So that’s Round 3! Lots of success, lots of challenges, and lots of surprises. The best part, though, are all of the wonderful people I have met along the way, and who have been an amazing source of support and inspiration. I’m looking forward to ROCKING THE ROW with all of you when Round 4 starts on October 3rd!

In the meantime, I’m off for a visit with my younger sister this weekend, and to have a bit more fun with my mom before she returns back home next Wednesday. After that, it’ll be back to the grind of studying, thesisizing, teaching, and hopefully squeezing in time to work on my WIPs. I haven’t actually written much of anything in the past two or three weeks, and it’s starting to make me feel a little crazy.

I have a few ideas for my Round 4 goals, and I as I’ll be taking Kristen Lamb’s “Blogging to Build Your Brand” class, I’m sure some of these goals will include retooling and refining my blog. I also need to figure out which project I’m going to tackle for November’s NaNoWriMo, but I’ll be chatting more about this once October rolls around.

That’s all for now, ROW80 friends (you can find everyone here). Hope to see you all on October 3rd!

ROW80: Trying to Shake the Panic

August 21, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 19 Comments

I’m trying to reconcile myself to the fact that August is rapidly coming to a close. The thought fills me with a bit of melancholy. My younger sister will be headed back to LA for her sophomore year of college at the end of the week, and I’ll be leaving for Santa Barbara in about a month. In the meantime, I have a lot of work to do on the thesis, and I’m feeling that familiar wave of panic over getting this first draft completed.

I’m also starting to stress out about the workload that I’ll have to tackle in the upcoming quarter: finishing and defending the thesis, taking two seminars, and teaching two discussion sections is a lot more than I’ve had to deal with in a while. I haven’t taught a discussion section in over a year, and while I love being in front of a classroom, I’m definitely a little rusty. Add this to the fact that I’m actually just tired of taking classes (only 4 left till I’m free of them!), and it makes for a fair amount of trepidation.

Anyway, onto some positive things. The highlights for the week included:

Catching up on my CampNaNo word count. tell me no lies is now 32.5k long, and I am slowly imposing structure upon the mad tangle of scenes that I’ve written. Only 17,438 words to go!
Diagnosing the plot problem that has plagued Path to the Peacock Throne for the better part of two months. The solution, however, means that the story is going to be a two-parter, but for the saga and adventure that I have in mind, I’ll need two books to tell Liandre’s tale. It’s a lofty goal, but one that I can’t wait to tackle. This might just be one of my Round 4 goals. 😀
Overhauling the “Novels In-Progress” page on the blog and adding new synopses for the three stories that I’m juggling. This has been a goal for a while now.
Following the #ASA2011 twitter feed for the annual American Sociological Association meeting, currently happening in Las Vegas. The venue of course means that there are many pithy observations about consumption and commodities, along with highlights from the sessions. Someone has also gone and made twitter accounts for social theorists Emile Durkheim (@emiledurkheim) and Talcott Parsons (@talcottparsons), which are hilarious, and filled with lots of nerdy soc jokes. For example:

Finally, I read a book! This has been on my to-do list for a few weeks now. I devoured Elizabeth Redfern’s Music of the Spheres, which is a murder mystery that takes place in 18th century London. It actually reminds me a fair bit of what I’m trying to do with tell me no lies, so it was both entertaining and useful.

Today is a hard-core work day, so I’m off to make some headway on the thesis, and hopefully add another 1600 words or so to my WIP. Have a wonderful week, all!

Monday Inspirations: The Bird Women of Vao Artan

July 25, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 5 Comments

I’ve gotten a number of comments over the past few days about my header, so I thought I’d talk a little bit about some the inspirations that I’m drawing from for my fantasy WIP, Path to the Peacock Throne.

Art by Susan Seddon Boulet

I’ve been nursing the idea for country founded and governed by women for some time now, and it was in April that I started to build the basic structure of the land I have since named “Vao Artan.” The central organizing myth is that the realm was settled by seven sisters, siblings who were in the goddess’s favor and blessed with dominion over the land. Each sister had a specific talent — the cultivation of land and livestock; hunting and martial prowess; music, painting, and the arts; scholarly research; mathematics and science; magic; and diplomacy and rule. The descendants of each sister correspond to a specific strata or occupation within the society.

This is where things get interesting. Each of the seven sisters is associated with a type of bird — swans and magic, owls and scholarly research, nightingales and the arts, etc. The bird imagery continues throughout the duration of the society, to the point where the military’s headquarters is known as “The Falconry,” and the royal mage is known as “The Cygne” (cygne being French for “swan”). Each queen takes the name of a bird to represent her personality/rule. The current queen, Vaedyn, is known as the “Eagle’s Claw,” which symbolizes her status as a warrior. My MC, Liandre, will take the peacock for her standard.

So with that in mind, I’ve been collecting all sorts of bird-related things to help me out with world-building. I’ve been thinking about fashion, architecture, and decor, among other odds and ends. Today, though, I’m going to look at fashion.

Luckily, the fashion world has been drawing on avian inspirations for ages now, so there’s a wide range of ideas from which I can draw.

Feathers will definitely be integrated into this tale, from the crests that adorn the helmets of the nation’s soldiers and warriors and other accessories, like jewelry and belts, to elaborate gowns, cloaks, and other items of clothing.

I am completely in love this headpiece by Arturo Rios, which is elegant and dramatic, as well as a bit gothic. It’s just the sort of thing the aristocrats of Vao Artan might wear.

I also love the idea of drawing inspiration for makeup and cosmetics from birds, like makeup artist Mark Lim did here, using this absolutely gorgeous peacock headpiece and choker. (This is actually a look I’ve attempted with the bright blue and green eyeshadow, but I’m not nearly this talented!)

Other pretties include these phenomenal necklaces designed by Lucy Hutchings. They are apparently inspired by the Bowerbird, “who loves to feather his nest with lots of blue to attract an egglayer,” according to Trendhunter. I’ve introduced a similar sort of necklace into the third chapter of PPT, which is worn by the witch (or “Mother Cygne”) Simone. Instead of being made from stones of blue-green, it is a rope of egg-sized, rough-hewn amethysts.

The women of Vao Artan, I think, like their jewelry big and bold, their clothing bright and colorful, and their accessories noticeable. They are women after my own heart. 😉

Finally, here’s one last gown, created by Indonesian designer Anne Avantie. It doesn’t have any explicitly avian details, but the color scheme is absolutely perfect for a young woman about to assume the “peacock throne.” The model also reminds me of the way that Liandre appears in my mind, which is an extra bonus:

And there we have it! A wee peek into the world that I am attempting to craft for Path to the Peacock Throne. For more pictures and ideas, you can visit my Pinterest board (which is my method of choice for organizing world-building ideas).

Where do you turn for inspiration when you’re crafting a new tale? How do you organize your ideas — scrapbooking, collages, digital photo galleries?

ROW80: Rolling Right Along

July 24, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 28 Comments

Happy Sunday, friends! I’m currently feeling a touch under the weather, so it’s going to be a Josh Groban, tea, and fuzzy socks sort of morning for me. 🙂

I want to extend another welcome to the bloggers who are visiting from the SheWrites Blog Hop. It’s gotten bumped down a bit, but my official welcome message is here. I’m looking forward to getting to know you all! For those of you who haven’t checked it out yet, please do. There are many of wonderful writers who have joined up.

I’m slowly trying to give this blog a bit more structure and life instead of only using it for ROW80 updates, so over the next few weeks you will see more posts on non-check-in days, covering a wider variety of topics. I’m toying with the idea of book reviews, wee blurbs about the historical research that I’m doing, discussions of world-building (which is one of my favorite past-times), and maybe a post or two on how I’m using philosophy and sociological theory in my work.

I added my first “experimental post” yesterday — a few idle musings about love and romance in the Odyssey, one of my favorite works out of ancient Greek literature. I’d love to hear any feedback that you may have!

Now then, onto my update:

The Life List Club: I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the ways that I can strive for a more balanced and healthy life, and so I am throwing my hat in the ring for the Life List Club. I’ve created a page for my list, which includes ten goals that I will pursue over the next year. I’ll try and report in on these, maybe during my Wednesday check-ins.

Social Networking: I downloaded TweetDeck on Thursday! I think I spent the first twelve hours just staring at it, because it is so very pretty. I am now learning the ins and outs of hashtags, and twitter communities, and lots of other awesome stuff like that, and I am having an absolute ball chatting with people.

Relevant to this: the Pew Research Center has found that spending time on social networking sites actually leads to a strengthening of interpersonal bonds, and helps to foster trust in others.

Writing continues on. I’ve been meeting (and, at times, exceeding) my goals over the past few days, which is awesome. Strange Bedfellows is coming along quite well, and I’m basically forcing myself to throw down words for Path to the Peacock Throne. I’m trying to lay down the overall skeleton for the final half of the book, and I am ignoring the perfectionist inside of me that keeps wailing that it isn’t absolutely perfect. I’m also struggling to find my MC’s voice, so I’m doing lots of writing exercises in the 1st person… and wondering if the story might actually be better served as a 1st person tale, rather than 3rd person.

Today’s goal includes finally getting around to tell me no lies, the story that is starting to feel like the neglected middle child (yes, my stories have feelings). I’d like to have the first chapter laid out — just the action and the dialogue. I’ll fill in the blanks with description and whatnot later.

Finally, the thesis is slowly taking form. My thesis advisor sent along a list of helpful suggestions and critiques yesterday, and she and I are meeting today to chat about my progress. I think I am going to approach this draft the way I do my fictional work: put the words onto paper, finish the draft, and then sit back, review, and figure out how to make it amazing.

And that’s all from me! I’m off to drink more tea and grade the rest of these papers before I have to dash off to meet my advisor. Enjoy the rest of the weekend, all!

ROW80: Recovering from Vacation

July 20, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 8 Comments

Happy Hump Day!

I’m back home from the family holiday, and it feels good to be snug in my little apartment once again. Flying always takes a lot out of me, especially when I have to deal with layovers (and Santa Barbara airport is so tiny that I almost always have at least one layover), so all I want to do today is curl up with a blanket and a good book and do absolutely nothing. The instructor that I’m TA’ing for is wonderful and told me to go ahead and take today off, so I plan to devour one (or two!) of the Georgette Heyer regency romance novels I have sitting on the shelf. Grading and thesis-work will commence tomorrow once I’m rested up.

The second half of the trip was absolutely wonderful. We left my grandfather’s house in southern Nevada Sunday afternoon and made our way to the Las Vegas Strip, where my parents renewed their vows to mark their 25 wedding anniversary.

The Happy Couple

The event turned into a mini-Jamison reunion, with my mom’s younger brother and sister, niece, and father in attendance.

The family (except for me, as I am taking the picture)

All in all, it was a wonderful trip, especially because it was the first family vacation that we’ve taken since I moved out of the house for grad school, three years ago. Now that my sister has moved out to go to college, finding time for all four of us to be together is a major challenge. It’s good to be back in Santa Barbara and to have a little quiet time (three women in one family = lots of squabbling), but I do miss having all of them around. However, I don’t have to despair for long: summer session ends next Wednesday and fall quarter doesn’t begin until the 3rd week of September, so I’ll be driving back to San Francisco next weekend. I will have six weeks for lots of family time, and even better, lots of non-school time. I’ll also be able to work on the thesis without other distractions, which means that I should be pretty productive.

Now, for my ROW80 check-in. I didn’t have internet access Sunday-Tuesday, so I basically worked my smartphone to the bone. I now know how to utilize my Twitter app, the WordPress app, the MS Word app, and the copy/paste function — all incredibly useful tools for when I’m on-the-go. I also managed to write for an hour or so each night since the last check-in. Yesterday was the exception, as I was basically was sitting in an airport or airplane for six hours straight with nothing but my ipod, a blank notebook, and pen (that sounds like some sort of desert island challenge!), so I did a lot more brainstorming.

The breakdown, project-by-project:

Thesis: I took a break from the behemoth that is my thesis for the last few days. I have a check-in meeting with my advisor by the weekend, so cross your fingers that her feedback is favorable!

Strange Bedfellows: The characters for this story won’t shut up, so at the moment I am a slave to their whims. However, I was able to put a hold on the snappy and snarky dialogue to focus on developing the first couple of chapters, which is good, because I’ve been writing scenes out of order, just to get them out of my head. I added another 1400 words to this, which brings the current MS up to about 12,700 words. I went through my notes the other day and realized that this project took over my life at the beginning of July, so yeah, I’m a little shocked at this total word count.

Path to the Peacock Throne: I haven’t written anything new, but I devoted all of yesterday to working on backstory, world-building, and character development. There’s a lot of stuff that goes down in this tale before the story even begins, so the challenge is (1) getting the details all straightened out and (2) finding a way to allude to the backstory without a major infodump. I now have many handwritten pages with notes about systems of magic, and fictional civil wars, and my MC’s personality. She is shy and a bit aloof, I think, with a secret wish to travel and explore the world. She’ll get her wish in Act 2, though not quite in the way she imagined.

That’s all from me right now. Off to do a bit of bloghopping, and once I am done with that, to grab a book and enjoy a decadently lazy day.

Lena Corazon

Flights of Fancy