{"id":24332,"date":"2014-07-31T06:55:04","date_gmt":"2014-07-31T10:55:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/?p=24332"},"modified":"2014-07-31T06:55:04","modified_gmt":"2014-07-31T10:55:04","slug":"steve-vera-five-things-i-learned-writing-blood-sworn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/2014\/07\/31\/steve-vera-five-things-i-learned-writing-blood-sworn\/","title":{"rendered":"Steve Vera: Five Things I Learned Writing Blood Sworn"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Only scattered groups of exhausted heroes remain\u2026<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Veteran police chief Skip Walkins has really done it this time. After crossing realities to fight the onslaught of the Drynn, the spawn of the Underworld, he\u2019s one of only a few motley survivors of an epic massacre. By his blood, he\u2019s sworn to unite with Shardyn Knight Gavin Blackburn against the armies of Asmodeous the Pale, Lord of the Underworld and ruler of the Drynn. The two must seek resistance fighters wherever they can\u2014even in Vambrace, among those who killed Gavin\u2019s father.<\/em><\/p>\n

Reformed sociopath Donovan Smith has traveled to Vambrace for his own reasons\u2014the new voice in his head claims that there he will learn how he came to be the Antimage, impervious to the deadliest magical attacks. <\/em><\/p>\n

Donovan’s secrets may hold the key to defeating the Drynn, but they may upset the delicate alliance of the Blood Sworn in the process. And if Skip and Gavin can’t fight together as one, the Drynn will attain total victory over Earth and its magical twin, Theia.<\/em><\/p>\n

1)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 WRITING ROCKS! EDITING\u2026NOT SO MUCH.<\/h2>\n

You\u2019d think I had five eyeballs or something for saying this but according to the Twittersphere and my own little unscientific poll, most authors prefer editing to writing. That\u2019s just craziness. My childhood vision of author-hood was of me sitting at a computer blurring my fingers across a keyboard while laughing maniacally. Not quite. Sure, editing can be gratifying, sculpting my thoughts into strings of rhythms and cadence, but after a while, my brain melts. To me, editing is like taking out a load of laundry without a basket\u2014there are always a couple of socks that want to squirt out. Thank God for awesome editors.<\/p>\n

2)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 MUSIC, IT CAN SAVE YOUR LIFE.<\/h2>\n

So there I was, my head a Roman Candle, my brain spontaneously combusted. Looming deadline, panic setting in. Solution? Why, the Rocky IV training montage, of course. I had no choice. For two weeks I wrote in an artist\u2019s sanctuary cabin, (thanks, Abby!) way out in the woods, all by myself, in the dead of Autumn. It was stupendous, yes, but those nights when the words on the screen would wriggle and my thoughts would leak out of my ears, I\u2019d step outside onto that porch into darkness so black it had weight, and after listening to the night for several long minutes (it was creepy out there, when muskrats sound like grizzlies) I\u2019d put in my headphones, let the music pour into me, and refill my wellspring with Rocky, Chevelle and O Fortuna<\/em>. After twenty minutes or so I\u2019d open the door, step back into the light and go for another round. Over and over again. I need some new playlists, by the way, if anybody\u2019s feeling generous or has some suggestions\u2026<\/p>\n

3)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 THE CREATED BECOMES THE TEACHER.<\/h2>\n

Come again? How can a character, something I created turn around and teach moi<\/em>? If I may? One of the arcs in Blood Sworn<\/em> is that a sociopathic murderer is forced to become one of the greatest generals ever to live. Somebody\u2019s got to fight off the Underworld. Anyway, whether he can actually suppress his violent impulses is a secret, preciousss, but one of his gifts is a photographic memory. And our dark hero is well-read. In his mere twenty years of life he has studied The Art of War <\/em>by Sun Tzu, as well as Clausewitz, Jomini, Machiavelli, Thucydides, Robert E Lee and a slew more. Long story short\u2026he knows his shit. Of course, in order for him to know, I<\/em> have to know. Anything less would make me a fugeize-face. Here\u2019s the interesting part. In my research, which was rather extensive, I found myself becoming more strategic, better equipped to deal with the challenges life was throwing at me\u2014even made me a better chess player. I found that simply by being in proximity to so many masters actually influenced me. I won\u2019t plunge you all into detail, but every morning with my coffee (light and sweet, baby) I read the Denma translation of The Art of War <\/em>as well as the three essays that accompany it. Part of my life now. \u00a0And I beat Jerry\u2019s butt all the time in chess \u2014mwa ha ha, I mean, er, it\u2019s good.<\/p>\n

4)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 THE MOST IMPORTANT QUALITY FOR AN AUTHOR: RELENTLESSNESS<\/h2>\n

\u201cExertion is never giving up, but it isn\u2019t wearing oneself out. It\u2019s more like riding the wind than pushing a rock uphill.\u201d I got this little beauty from one of those essays I was just talking about and man\u2014<\/em>life-changer. I figured if I didn\u2019t quit…I wouldn\u2019t fail. Worked quite nicely. (Denma Translation Group. \u201cThe Sage Commander.\u201d The Art of War: The Denma Translation. <\/em>p.109)<\/p>\n

5)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 DUNGEON-MASTERING VS. COLLEGE.<\/h2>\n

Not even a contest. In college, I learned what a gerund is and how to dismantle a compound-complex sentence. Need a prepositional phrase to go with that BLT? Here ya go. Important for a writer? Sure, bordering on of course. But as a Dungeon Master, I learned something far more important\u2026how to tell a story and how to research. I\u2019d spend a month setting up a quest, researching medieval cities at the library (back in ancient times before the internet), creating voices for characters; I\u2019d know every tavern owner, weapons smith, evil sorcerer, and drool-spitting troll right down to the eyelash. I loved the expressions on my friends\u2019 faces when their eyes would widen and their mouths would part as I calmly explained to them that there was a long, brittle scratching coming from behind the door they were supposed to go through followed by a deep growl. And then I\u2019d wham on the table! Priceless. Wouldn\u2019t change those memories for the world. Take that, college.<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

Steve\u2019s just a guy who wishes he could fire lightning out of his fingertips. Afflicted with wanderlust at the age of seventeen, he\u2019s lived in seven states, briefly served in the U.S. Air Force as a Pararescue Trainee, and has a profound aversion to mint chocolate chip ice cream. Steve currently straddles two worlds\u2014one foot in his hometown of Elmwood, CT, the other in Sunnyside, Queens, NY. What bio would be complete without a cat? Steve has one. A great, fat, good-for-nothing but entirely lovable furball who has his own gravitational force. If Steve could go back in time and be anything, he\u2019d have been a P-51 Mustang fighter pilot or a knight. Being an author is pretty cool, though.<\/p>\n

Steve Vera: Website<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Blood Sworn: Amazon<\/span><\/a> | B&N<\/span><\/a> | Books-A-Million<\/span><\/a> | Carina Press<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

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Only scattered groups of exhausted heroes remain\u2026\u00a0 Veteran police chief Skip Walkins has really done it this time. After crossing realities to fight the onslaught of the Drynn, the spawn of the Underworld, he\u2019s one of only a few motley survivors of an epic massacre. By his blood, he\u2019s sworn to unite with Shardyn Knight […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-24332","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-theramble","8":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pv7MR-6ks","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24332"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24336,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24332\/revisions\/24336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}