Tag Archives: evidence of things not seen

Mechanics

May it be

I’ve been thinking about verbs for a while now, and I’m thinking that’s where I want to start with my rants posts about writing topics. And what better time to discuss verbs than the merry, merry month of May, right?

Right?

C’mon, guys—it’s a modal? A modal verb?

Yeah, on that note, I think we’ll be starting with the basics—like what the heck a modal is, anyway—and then go on to talk about how we use verbs in writing, including the dreaded passive voice. (Guess what—if you’re getting dinged by your critique partners for writing in the passive voice a lot, you might not be doing anything wrong. Then again, you might—but still, there’s hope!)

And I’m lining up guest posts from some brilliant English minds (even doctors, folks!), so be sure to check back next week—or subscribe to the blog to get RSS updates (or email updates)—to join in the “verbal” discussion.

In other news, I’m renaming my current works. Yes, I know, I can’t help it—I just read the chapter on titling in Stein On Writing and I found one that really struck me:

Saints and Agents

To match the new title for Duty of the Priest, Evidence of Things Not Seen is now Saints and Spies. The Projects page and excerpt page have been updated to reflect this.

And I promise soon to talk titling and explain this move. But first—verbs!

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Works

Happy birthday to me!

My birthday present to myself: finishing revisions on Evidence!

My birthday present to you: an excerpt from Duty of the Priest!

Presents that feel this good without costing a dime (no comment on opportunity cost): priceless.

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Works

Finito

One of these days I’m going to run out of ways to say it, but once again: I’m done! I was worried about the word count there for a while, and there are still some issues that are bugging me and some scenes that need to be fixed (and maybe added), but I just typed “the end.” (Okay, so first I said it over on Twitter.) And despite my concerns, I reached an acceptable 84,000 words.

I’ve got a page of notes of things I want to change, and I want to go through and work on physical descriptions of people and settings (especially the weather). Sometimes I get through first drafts and it’s like this whole story has taken place in a white room with blank-faced people—or at least it could have, from how much description I’ve given.

So the tentative title is Evidence of Things Not Seen. I’m kind of happy with it, even though it does seem a little long. It parallels nicely with Duty of the Priest:

  • They’re structurally parallel: both use prepositional phrases with an ‘of’ head.
  • Both come from scripture references (Duty is a rephrasing of Doctrine and Covenants 20:46 and Evidence is somewhat obviously from Hebrews 11:1.)
  • The first words of the titles, Duty and Evidence, aside from being handy handles to toss around, are also words with strong law enforcement connotations. Appropriate for FBI-themed novels, don’t you think?

Once again, I’m off to revisions!

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Works

I just couldn’t wait

I know, I know, it’s terrible of me, but I just couldn’t wait to get started on a sequel to my latest manuscript. I’m still revising the last book (Duty of the Priest, maybe?), but I just had to get the opening chapters out of the way of this book. They were driving me crazy, and I was starting to think I was going to forget some good lines I wanted (and I probably did).

Apparently I’m a glutton for punishment.

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