All posts by Xaphod

Ministratum – A Matter of Mood

Sometimes writing is difficult, and coaxing the words is a challenge that would try the most creative among us, and yet other times the words appear to come almost unbidden.  These times are special; stories can grow almost by themselves, like watching a skeleton grow flesh and come to life.

I frequently find it interesting to look at the mood of different parts of my work and I cannot help but see a certain similarity between my own thoughts and feelings and those parts of the book that seem to write themselves.  I think this is somewhat natural – possibly so much so that saying so is a little redundant, because it is so obvious.

Continue reading

Opening My Mind

One of my main goals with writing a blog detailing my struggles with both writing and depression was to document my progress in both so that maybe others might gain insight from my journey.  However, I’ve been a little too apprehensive to make my thoughts and feelings public.. but then I realised it wasn’t actually serving its purpose.. so.. I was conflicted

In the end I’ve decided to make my blog open to people to view, and hope some folks will find some of what I’ve written here instructive, or at least if I don’t serve as an example to others I might at least serve as a warning.

Another Novel Update

Planning ahead is something some authors find hinders them, and restricts their characters, and prefer to just write from the beginning through to the end with only a light hand on the tiller.

Myself, I am not one of those authors; I prefer to make sure I have a plan as well-defined as I can have from the start, and I would be surprised if most authors did not have at least some kind of pre-defined plan, even a loose one.  I find it hard to imagine how anyone could produce anything coherent without one.

Continue reading

Allowing Me To Be Me

Allowing myself to be depressed is one of the first real breakthroughs I feel like I have had, despite it not sounding like one, but I’ll explain.
Guilt has often been one of my real issues. Guilt at not being ‘ok’, guilt at not being ‘normal’, at not being capable of work at the moment. I’ve spent so much of the time kicking myself while I’ve been down that I’ve failed to notice how down that has made me, and I’ve failed to deal with the real problems.

More Ministratum

Chapter thirteen is the part of my book that has been most heavily based on an afternoon of gaming so far, and consequently it has been one of the most challenging to write.  That seems paradoxical, however when you consider the difference between four friends having a laugh and attempting to create a serious high-fantasy world with a cast of three-dimensional coherent characters, then the reasons become clearer.

Continue reading