AQATSA update: OH HAI THERE PLOT HOLE!

[inverarity]

(Judgmental Bookseller Ostrich is much funnier than LOLcats.)


Yeah, I suddenly realized I was staring at one big plot hole and a couple of minor ones. So even though I was trying to just keep writing and deal with problems later, I had to go back and rewrite a bunch of stuff in several chapters. So the last couple of days my word count did not increase much because most of what I wrote was rewriting. And I still haven't worked all the plot holes out yet...

Curse you, Greyhound!

So, at one point, Alexandra is trying to run away leave Chicago using Muggle transportation. Like a good author, I do my research. It turns out Greyhound has all kinds of rules for unaccompanied minors. They apply to children fourteen and under.

Hmm. Okay. Alexandra is almost fifteen, so she can probably fake it...

Exception
In accordance with Illinois state law, NO tickets will be sold to unaccompanied minor children under the age of 17 for interstate or intrastate travel from locations within the state of Illinois.

Argh! Curse you, Greyhound, and curse you, state of Illinois!

Yes, yes, I know -- hardly anyone reading my story is actually going to go look up Greyhound's Unaccompanied Children rules like I did. But it matters, dammit!

(Okay, go ahead and laugh at me because I'm trying to write a believable way for a fourteen-year-old to sneak across state lines in a story where fourteen-year-olds carry magic wands...)

That was just a teeny little plot hole, btw. The big one is, like, rip-up-three-chapters big.

My Poser Skills Are Teh Suck

And I started trying to make a rough draft of the AQATSA cover, and can't get anything that doesn't look... well, bad. I look back at all the illustrations I did for AQATLB and AQATDR and cringe. I mean, some are kind of cool, in a cheesy way, but more and more I do not like the "look" of my characters as Poser figures. I am always telling myself I'm going to put in some more time polishing my graphic arts skillz (I even bought a couple of books on using Photoshop!) but on the list of things for me to spend my time on (in which, unfortunately, neither "reading" nor "writing" takes the #1 spot), becoming a better Poser/Photoshop geek is not rating significant hours out of my day.

I'm almost considering paying some starving college student on deviantART to do some illos for me. (Hey, it's not that strange. Back when I gamed a lot, I actually paid for a few character illustrations.) Problem is, most of the stuff on DA is either heavily manga/anime-style or pneumatic airbrushed babes whose boobs would affect the tides.

So, I am at 157K words, and Chapter 25. No wordle. Maybe I'll give you a Poser illustration next time.

Comments

[inverarity.livejournal.com]

When I was 8, I would walk several blocks to school by myself. Nowadays, parents who let an 8-year-old do that would almost risk being charged with child neglect. (Not really, but you'd get an almost universal horrified reaction.)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_silverfox/]

Here 8 year olds still do. I said 10 above, because that's the age at which we start secondary school, and primary school is usually in walking distance, so no public transport would be involved.

I have met a mother who was afraid of trusting a public bus with her tiny little boy (of 14) and preferred to drive him herself, though. (She trusted the boy to know how to use the bus just fine, but not the driver to know how to drive ...)