In the past week since the release of “The Chalice” I have been busily catching up with projects that I’ve been putting off for too long. As is always the case it seems, I don’t know for how long I will remain where I am and I have no intention of carting my library of notes with me anymore.
Many of them are creased, faded, and dog-eared having been stuffed and crushed into boxes or old binders at some point or another as they followed me around. So, I decided to scan all my old notebooks, scraps of paper, beer mats and save them to a backup drive. Not a problem you might think (as I thought), but as I have some 20+ years of notes to get through the pile was quite daunting (and threw the occasional snide comment at the printer whenever I wasn’t looking).
Anyway, it has been a long and tedious process, but a necessary one. Now I have a truly gargantuan collection of files stored on a drive that I can access without having lug boxes everywhere I go.
Despite the monotony of setting old paper upon a scanner bed and then listening to the mechanical drone of a what can only be described as the sounds made by a horde of librarian bees as they busily gather words and sentences to be filed away; it was interesting to see some of what I had written in years past.
There were whole chapters waiting to be edited for books that I had intended to write and never did. I found scores of ideas for stories scrawled in pencil and ink, some of which I couldn’t even remember writing (and maybe I didn’t as some of the ideas were very good).
Now, after a week of scanning, I am down to the last few notebooks (those seen on the left – the cover was done by a friend). These are the final notes I made during the writing of “Throne of Ice“.
Yes, those that have followed or visited this blog since it’s humble beginning as “The Tapestry” will perhaps wonder whatever became of my ‘first’ novel, “Throne of Ice”? The book that I worked so hard on for much of the lifespan of this blog. Well, where is it you may ask?
Well, after the manuscript was rejected over a 2-3 year period of looking for an agent or publisher, I decided that it was a story best left for a later date. “Throne of Ice” is complete, full-length, and I could have just published it myself now instead of moving forward as I did with “The Chalice”.
So why didn’t I?
After considering the timeline for the story told within “Throne of Ice” I felt that it might be better to delay the publication until a much later date. It would be better for it in the long run. It also makes more sense since the story itself takes place a few years after “The Chalice” and a much longer time after the storyline I am working on detailing the Great War.
Anyway, enough babbling. Time for me to feed those bees that live within my scanner…
Isn’t it a strange experience when you take up old notes? And old stories, for that matter. Sometimes I smile at my innocence of many years ago, but some other times I think, “Hey, this was actually a good idea.”
Scanning is tedious, that’s true. But then, how handy it is to have all your notes on the tip of your finger? Magic, isn’t it? 😉
Very much so. The only problem is that I often end up sat there reading material I wrote years ago instead of actually scanning. Ha! Upon occasion, I would find myself longing for days past when I wrote something as a child. The eye that gazes through the veil of youth has such a different outlook of the world.