Karavansara

15 June 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Thinking in lifespans

So I have a new idea for my next novel
This writing thing is going to my head.
But anyway – thanks to a sleepless night during a thunderstorm, I set down the basic premise, placed two or three ideas on the map, have a few scenes rather vividly painted in my mind, and I’ve started collecting references and stuff.

And a funny thing happened.
The story I’m planning will be a historical fantasy – looks like that’s my game, these days – set in the 18th century.
The exact time frame is somewhat problematic, and I’ll have to make some hard choices – choosing a certain year instead of another means my characters will be dealing with different historical characters and events.
Anyway… Continue reading →

14 June 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Tim Curry as the Pirate king

I’m sort of in a piratical mood, these days, and here’s a fine performance by the great Tim Curry, in the role of the Pirate King from Gilbert & Sullivan‘s Pirates of Penzance.

Enjoy!

13 June 2015
by Davide Mana 1 Comment

Strength is not just kicking ass (and vice-versa)

Something funny happened the other day – funny up to a point, as I will try and explain later.

One of the usual debates started, about reading and writing and what else, and the discussion turned to strong female characters, and we were given a brief lecture about how

a woman will never be stronger than a man – it’s a matter of muscular mass: the strongest woman warrior will always be at the same level of a mid-range male warrior, and she could never beat a stronger opponent

Now, this statement is – of course – mindboggingly asinine on two counts¹ …
Continue reading →

12 June 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Writing Prompt: A Lady With a Secret

Let’s go on with our character studies: faces, expressions, stances, attitudes.
Clothes and accessories.
Can we build a story out of these details?

Here’s a photo of Lillian Russell, taken in 1904 (probably).

I find her expression intriguing.

Is there a story, in that face?
But also in the way she’s standing, in the hand that holds the fan.

What’s going on?
What character is this?

You tell me your interpretation, maybe I’ll tell you mine.

11 June 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Sir Christopher Lee

Sir Christopher Lee has gone to join his friends Peter Cushing, Vincent Price and John Carradine wherever legends go when their time among us is up.
He will be missed.

11 June 2015
by Davide Mana 2 Comments

Reading for writing

On the subject of writing handbooks, I think I already expressed my unorthodox views – as far as I’m concerned, if it works for you it’s fine.
Me, I collect the things – and my friends know, and often give me writing books for my birthday, or for Christmas.

One thing I think is a pity is, most writing handbooks are written with the absolute beginner in mind – they spend all of the time talking about Point of View, Show Don’t tell, Infodumps and Exposition, and then maybe they give us the short version of the Hero’s Journey.
Nothing really wrong with that but, ok, let’s say I got that part by the time I was 16 and by the time I was 20 I had learned – thanks to authors like Tom Robbins or Elmore Leonard or Lawrence Block or Karl Hiaasen – that all of that stuff was good and fine and writing was something else altogether.

So I do collect writing books, but I really really cherish advanced books.
And I was given one for my birthday – it’s called Narrative Design: working with imagination, craft and form, it was written by Madison Smartt Bell, and it is a book about reading. Continue reading →

10 June 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

New surprise project, and Scrivener

OK, so yesterday I got an idea for a new non-fiction book in Italian – a fun thing that might have a market and is based on the classic 36 Stratagems by Sun Tzu.
A nice intersection of some stuff I’ve been doing recently and my long-standing interest for Chinese culture.

Currently I have a lot of stuff on my plate, but this is the sort of sweet and easy thing I can do in my spare time, and it’s probably going to find a lot of readers and sell nicely.
In the spirit of doing the maximum work with the minimum expenditure of energy¹, I set out to outline and plan the book as a sort of ultrafast, guerrilla project.
Scrivener, the software i normally use for big projects, was pretty useful.