David Kudler's Blog, page 7

I’ve written nearly sixty-eight thousand words of��Bright Eyes,��the sequel to��Risuko.

The most satisfying word of all to write?

That’s the��kanji character for “The End.”

After all this time, I have a complete draft of the second Seasons of the Sword book ��� and I’m really excited about being able to finally share more than snippets with you!

I’m working hard at editing ��� and if you’ve signed up for Risuko’s Beta Army, you’ll be hearing from me soon. And we’ve set a release date: May 5, 2022. (That’s Japanese Children’s Day, for what it’s worth.)

Pre-order ebook, audiobook, and print on Stillpoint Digital Press ��� or Books2Read.com/Bright-Eyes

Keep an eye out for news, exciting offers, and more ��� and sign up for our newsletter, if you haven’t already! You’ll get free access not only to updates, but downloads of the prequel��Kunoichi Companion Tales as well.

(Oh, and in case you’re wondering what I happened to the character who refused to die… I killed them off. Gleefully. And I’d do it again!)

The post Bright Eyes Complete! appeared first on Seasons of the Sword.

This morning, I was giving a talk to a group of writers on Joseph Campbell and the Hero Journey or Monomyth (in this case, specifically with regards to setting, rather than plot or character). I ran the group through a basic overview of Campbell’s schema, and gave them a number of examples from movies (since visuals are always helpful) ��� including two movies that I know for a fact consciously used Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces as inspiration: Star Wars: A New Hope and The Matrix. And I mentioned that, while I loved the first Matrix movie, I felt as if I could hear the pages of Campbell’s magnum opus turning as Neo’s journey progressed. Call to Adventure? Check. Crossing the Threshold? Check. Belly of the Beast? Double-check…

One of the participants asked, very reasonably, how to use and honor the Hero’s Journey schema without falling into the trap of writing a story that is formulaic.

When I was studying to be an actor, we had a wonderful master teacher named Archie Smith. Now in addition to being a terrific teacher, he was also (though in his late 60s) still an actor and a student of acting; he would sit in on many of our classes with other teachers and go through the exercises they had us work on, then apply them to his own work on stage and talk to us about what he’d learned.

One day, one of our classmates asked Archie how we could keep all of our acting fresh, even as we tried to apply all of these technical concepts that we were learning. Archie told us to learn all of the techniques that he and our other teachers were giving us, to internalize them��� and then, he said with great glee, ���Toss them out the window!���

When I���m writing, I try to think about the Monomyth cycle (and about all of the other skills and techniques I’ve picked up) as I���m researching, outlining, and note-taking. But then I put all of out of my mind as much as possible. I take Archie (and Binky) to heart, and… toss them out the window.

I almost always find that in my books (for example, Risuko), I���ve followed the schema ��� just not quite as slavishly (hopefully) as they did in The Matrix.

I think Campbell would say that the story will tend to follow the pattern whether we want it to or not ��� it���s an expression of the structures of the unconscious mind, after all.

However, being conscious of those structures allows us to make choices about how we want to follow the pattern. Knowing that the setting of the world of supernatural wonder (���the forest adventurous,��� ���the land of adventure,��� etc.) has to reflect an inversion of some sort to the world where we and the protagonist started out allows us to make choices about what exactly is going to change, so we can make notes, draw, collect pictures���

Then toss them out the window and write.

The post Toss them out the window! Using and forgetting the Hero’s Journey appeared first on Stillpoint Digital Press.

Last summer, I had a really interesting conversation with Scott Calhoun of the Inner Typewriter about Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey�� and how authors can use it to enrich and focus their writing:

Among other things, I look at��Risuko, and how my work on it reflects the Hero Journey.

The Hero’s Journey is a registered trademark of Joseph Campbell Foundation (JCF.org)

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Let It Go, the newest friendly menage tale by K.D. West, comes out on Friday, August 2! PRE-ORDER TODAY Let It Go follows Helen, Tommy, and Al (from Let It Snow), as they reach their gold at the end of the rainbow. Their ride off into the sunset. Their polyamorous honeymoon on an idyllic tropical … Continue reading Preview: Namaste (Let It Go) →

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Thanks so much for the feedback — and sorry for not seeing this until now!

Since one of the main characters in the series — Lady Chiyome — is almost always addressed with the honorific, I made the stylistic choice in the first book to switch from the English version to the Japanese — Chiyome-sama — and back. I did this partially to keep things from being too repetitious, and partially to introduce the Japanese to the reader. (This is a series aimed at teens, not all of whom have been exposed to Japanese traditions and language.)

In this book, then, I chose to do the same thing. Do you find it too annoying?

Dropping by because I stumbled across this on Google.

Uh… Doesn’t it sound odd that you use Lord Takeda in one sentence and Takeda-sama in the other? There’s no reason for the switch.

Is four too many — or not enough? It’s Gina’s twenty-first birthday, and she’s ready to celebrate with her fabulous boyfriends Jim, Matt, and Sam. But an unexpected encounter makes Gina rethink many of her assumptions, questioning even the stability of their ménage à quatre. Follow Gina through a day of surprises, excitement, passion — and … Continue reading Preview: Foxtrot, Tango, Whiskey (from The Visitor Rises) →

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