It looks like some straight-to-DVD loser when displayed in its poorly designed slip case on the shelves of your local rental store but Gabriel is actually a good deal more than your average C-list snoozefest.

Made for a tiny budget with a cast and crew who were happy to defer their own payment (which had it been necessary would have escalated production costs into the millions) Gabriel tells the story of a battle in purgatory between the seven Arcs (Archangels) and the seven Fallen. Purgatory is a city, Gabriel is an action hero, everyone wears trenchcoats and fires guns at one another (or if no ordnance is handy they kick and punch effectively). Many questions about this basic Manichean morality and metaphysics are toyed with. It’s not that it’s the deepest movie ever made, more it gets points for trying when no one else does.

I am not too surprised, however, by the fact that it leaves a lot of people cold. It’s the first time I’ve actually been able to point the finger and say “look what happens when you don’t give the script the attention it deserves”. The featurette that the distributors package on the DVD spends about thirty seconds talking about the script (and then it’s more about the “idea” for the “story” not the underlying mecanism of the script). If Back To The Future’s script is held up as an example of the absolute best in nuts and bolts script writing (apparently every line of dialogue in the film is purposeful in that it builds the story, no one says anything that doesn’t in some way contribute to some story task like signposting, foreshadowing, or paying off) then Gabriel’s script could be an example of what happens when you just want a script of some quality but you don’t really mind how much.

Don’t get me wrong the film is not horrible and the script is passing fair. However the number of loose ends and unresolved issues it leaves behind are a testament to just how happy the team were to get the thing made quickly, cheaply and how little understanding they had of just how important scripting could be.

Much aside from the fact that Gabriel polished off a demon in the blink of an eye with absolutely no feeling of moment or occasion (twenty minutes later he reeled the demon’s name off as one of those he’d already eliminated, even after that I had to retcon the actual incident from the featurette) there were more serious problems. One angel is reputed to have “lost their wings”. We don’t know how this condition comes to pass but apparently it’s permanent, serious, and completely changes the angel into a human (who’s dead in purgatory, but can ascend to heaven or descend to hell the same as a normal person). With no real explanation of how this could come to pass the punishment seems arbitrary, unrealistic and somewhat lacking in weight.

It reminds us that the only reason to write the nasty fate of someone who is not the main character is as a shadow or omen of the possible cost of failure to the current main character. Gabriel is an angel, and thus no more immune, apparently, to losing his wings than anyone else. The question remains, how does it happen? What does it entail? If we had details we could feel concern for the protagonist, without those mechanisms the threat is idle.

Gabriel informs us, through its several failures (which are not the sum of its parts, let’s not forget, much is done well, the rhythm of dialogue is good, clarity never an issue, and the subject matter is incredibly difficult so that’s a special boon in this case) of the mechanistic aspects of storytelling. Charlie Chaplin summarised the business of plot communication, to paraphrase: “Tell them you’re going to tell them something, tell them, and then tell them you’ve told them”.

If you’re a Nano contestant then the pressure to slap a bit more prose into the heap is paramount. I can understand that. Unfortunately it’s all the poor storytelling that comes back to bite you in the rear. Writing that perfect plot centres on a process of accruing story. Not assuming that people understand things.

Next time you’re writing a metaphysical action blockbuster and you blithely refer to an angel losing their wings, don’t just assume that people know how that happens or what it means. There could be a good couple of thousand words there in a satisfying explanation of the phenomenon.

Quite a different one this year as well because it happened in the midst of the rest of life. I don’t care what anyone says writing and real life need the accompaniment of light time wasting or else you might just go bonkers.

It’s been my favourite Nano of the three mostly because it proved I could live life and get 50,000 words done in a month. If I don’t have to live life it can take me five days but that’s not a practical situation.

Over the course of November it has come to my thoughts that although I am a writer, and I love to take on a novel project, and will continue to write novels, I am foremost another type of writer. It’s just that the type of writer I am is quite a new, specialised and rare kind.

The fact is in the past year I have roughed out the plans for at least five role playing systems, I have finished one novel and started one more. I am also writing an online comic. But I think the role playing point is the relevant one. I am never happier than when reading a role playing manual, GMing a game or playing a game, or thinking of new games. I also think the role playing community could well benefit from the imagination of someone with my background in the hobby.

It does also help to tie together why I am a computer programmer. Systems + Imagination = Games. So, if you detect a drift in the content of the site as time goes on you’ll now know why. I believe way back when blogging was new this kind of thing was assumed to be expected. A blog is a float not a velocity.

So this is what Nanowrimo is supposed to feel like. The other two times I did it I had plenty of time to sit around writing my novel and blogging away and merrily watch my skyrocketing word count. This month although I am making steady progress towards the goal I am not entirely certain I will make 50k before it actually materialises. It is not a question of difficulty it is a question of fitting it in around my life. I really want to go play a computer game or do something pointless like that but I have a Levercastle to write. Still… nearly there.

Levercastle lives.

It’s not a village. It’s a town. A small town. But a town. I just can’t make it be small enough to call it a village.

Only 60% of my 50,000 target to reach.

I think that if I were going to start handing out advice to people from the heat of battle I would advise the selection of a subject and style that will be as much escapism to write as it is to read. November is an idea time for a mind to holiday in the late Levercastle summer.

*goes off to find more fictional ice cream*

Just thought I’d make that clear. After 2006s series that was all about inspiration I’m going to move it on to the business of actually thinking about a novel. I will try to put more exercises up but I’m thinking of this as a series on “Advanced Noveling” if you like. It’s for people who can hit a story with their best shot and maybe cruise up to 35,000 words or so and then may find themselves languishing.

The last series, which may be found in the “Writing Tips” category. Dealt with the business of getting something down and planning out a novel when you have nothing. I know a lot of other people find that they have plenty of something but then they find a good start gives way to the experience of waading through waist high treacle wearing boots of lead. All the plans in the world have trouble saving you from that.

I’m actually looking to make external a lot of what goes on in my head when I am stuck. It tends to go in three stages. One: Thinking “oh, I’ll just take a break here”, Two: realise three months later that I have become “stuck” in that project, Three: Whilst doing something unrelated realise why I was stuck and sit down to write again until stage One repeats.

Whether anything is happening subconsciously between these stages I am not sure (due to any process in question being, er, subconscious) but I know that the problems always go through those stages until they are resolved.

I have found that I can force it but I don’t very often. I guess I will do do more often when I have as much time as I need to write.

I am about to solve one of Ian’s problems. My ex-pat friend currently resident in the land of the kangaroo was always confounded by the fact that it took just as much time and effort to write a bad novel as it did to write a good one. In theory, the novelist would always think their work had some worth, after all who would spend all that time bashing out something even they thought was rubbish (unless someone was willing to pay them unfeasible amounts of money to write tripe, of course, this happens on occasion)? This is why Ian (mild to mid dyslexic in addition to being incredibly self-critical) had never really got along with writing.

I can see his point. The first time I finished a novel, a respectable 70 odd thousand word’s worth of the most stinking slimy prose ever to infest this planet, I was proud. At the time I was able to see that it possibly wasn’t the best novel ever written but it had some nice ideas. Actually, it did have some nice ideas. That’s what’s called raw talent. It was still a shapeless bag of spanners. Too many characters, too many set pieces, characters with no real motive, terrible dialogue, the list goes on. But there’s a large proportion of literate people who haven’t written 70,000 words of anything off the top of their head. Most people just don’t have the imagination, the determination, the grit to produce even the worst 70,000 word novel ever written. If you can sit through that process, grind your teeth and push forward until you can write “the end”, then that is something to be proud of. It’s a certification of dedication, ambition and endurance.

That quickly wears off. About six or seven novels later merely “writing a lot of words” has become something it is well within your field of accomplishment to achieve. The fear of not finishing dulls. Even if you don’t finish this one you once finished a novel. Writing a novel becomes something you “have done” and after a little more time and effort becomes something you “can do”. It sounds weird but once you are a novelist you can feel no more proud of finishing another novel than you can of visiting the bathroom first thing in the morning. You finished another book, big deal.

That’s where Level 2 kicks in, and within Level 2 the answer to the “Pride of the crap author” dilemma. As I apply the final few tweaks to Starfall I am proud of it. Not proud of finishing 130,000 words, even though that’s 30,000 more than my previous best in terms of word count. Like I said, numbers are just numbers. No, I am proud of Starfall because it is a novel I believe people should want to read. I actually would recommend anyone who likes fiction books in the horror/fantasy genres to pick it up and read it as a priority matter. I am proud of its accessibility because it is also complex. I am proud of its ideas because they apply much research in an involving way. I am proud of its epic sweep because it’s also quite grounded.

I am proud of this novel in a way that I have never been proud of any of the ones before it. If I was to get everyone in the world to read one book by me this would be the one. I am hoping that my next book will be equal in stature, if not greater. This is not pride at the achievement in terms of work produced. This is pride in the fact of this story’s very existence. Not saying I couldn’t do better. Not saying it is perfect (whatever that means). Not saying I have nowhere left to go. No. Not saying any of that. All I am saying is that I believe in this book. I believe that it is something people would be better off for having read. I believe people are poorer for not having read it.

That’s the kind of pride that isn’t just about a word count.

I would just like to take a moment to say hello to the sudden influx of people who’ve just visited my little corner of the internet for the first time from Nanowrimo. I have never had tracking software installed for November before and to see my traffic leap from 6 to 8 people per day to 30 people in a single day is quite bizarre.

I’ve mostly been whingeing about the paucity of available activity pre-Nano as I’ve slacked off all other projects and Starfall is a few seemings and lookings from done. I have very little creative going on at present. This is weird.

So I offered up some free advice earlier, don’t know if it helped. I guess it probably didn’t because it was what I might describe as an “Advanced Novelling Technique” that I didn’t even know I’d fully formed in my head.

Well, last time round about Nano time I wrote my first “Writing Tips” series which basically outlined ways to get the old brainbox ticking over and ready for a spot of creative writing. I still stand by these techniques for generating a hella vast pile of research scribblings to be turned into a novel. Now, maybe, it is time to pick up where that left off. There’s a bunch of stuff I’ve become aware of as a novelist from writing and editing Starfall and I think around the Nano time of the year is the season to share.

So watch out, further Writing Tips are coming in the lead up to, and possibly occasionally during, November.

I’m not so sure where to start.

Putting the last lick of paint on Starfall. I cannot convey to you at this stage how enormously proud I am of this novel. I have worked on novels longer than two years but have never spent so much time perfecting a product to within an inch of its life. I am currently trawling for instances of the words “looking”, “seeming” and “really” those being my overused danger words. I’d hate for the reader’s experience to be blown by overused words and some jumbled syntax. Yoda I do not want to write like.

On which subject the Doodler, Mrs and new friend John have been helping me out as I slog my way through the read-aloud version of the tome, for which I am eternally grateful. Doodler was making some remark about how books just aren’t illustrated, like it was something you don’t do. I had a think about this and came to the conclusion that the only real reason it’s not done is because it would cost too much. The Doodler continues to work on 6 Icons which is evolving. I never realised that preparing for an enterprise such as 6 Icons involved a Rocky Balboa-esque period of training after which you can flick your wrist and turn out an image of one of your characters. So we have some time to go before we can put out some episodes but once the ball starts rolling we will find ourselves in a much more regular position.

So in the meanwhile Doodler has expressed an interest in getting his work out there via my books and covers. This would be cool and we shall see how that starts to happen soon. I enjoyed very much seeing some of my ideas realised by my Antipodean cohort Ian and to have a professional illustrator on board is really a great leap forward.

Finally I have been gazing into the murky realms of speed reading. It’s no secret that I have a review regularity score somewhere in the 1 every 6 months region and all the laptop’s turned out to have done is spur me on to finish Starfall thus far. This with NaNoWriMo coming up in about four weeks leads me to surmise that any help in getting those reviews done would be vastly appreciated. I think once I’ve eventually cleared my commitments I am going to be shutting the review door until I have time. So possibly for the next four decades. Seriously.