Clay Gilbert's Blog

Finished another chapter on Annah’s Exile today.  Although it’s a ‘sequel’, technically, it’s really just a book-length ‘chapter’ in a longer story, and page one of the novel flowed pretty organically out of the end of the first one.  And if it’s not organic, to me, it’s not worth it.

I don’t outline.  I start with characters, their personalities, their interests, and proceed into the conflicts that arise out of those things and the resolution that eventually arises.  I occasionally know scenes that will occur down the road, but sometimes those change slightly, or greatly, depending on what the characters tell me.  I’ve told this story before to friends, but it’s worth putting down here:  When I was writing Annah, I had it in my mind that Annah would resolve a particular issue/conflict/debate by talking to the senior members of her clan/tribe.  When I started attempting to write that scene, it didn’t seem to flow organically, and then, I found myself hearing her voice, very distinctly telling me, “I do not know what you think I am going to do, but I am not going to the Elders’ Council.  I am going to the hearth of my parents to talk to them about this.”

That worked better.  I’ve since learned not to argue with Annah about the way things should be; letting her tell me the story tends to work better–and I see no reason not to continue that way, here in book two.   Anyone else have their characters talk to them?

While Annah‘s journey to publication is still just beginning, I did want to say a few words about my publisher, PDMI Direct.  They’re a small press out of Alabama, and run by the husband and wife team of TC McKinney and Nessa Arcamenel.  They lavish a tremendous amount of care not only on the books they produce, but on their business partnerships with the authors they publish.  They publish works across a wide range of genres under several different imprints all managed by PDMI, and the attention they give to each author and each book is something I would not expect to see in the ranks of the larger publishing houses.  Take a look at what PDMI has to offer at their website, pdmidirect.com, where you can find individual pages devoted to each author they work with.  TC and Nessa make themselves available for questions and input from their authors, and this communication–and this openness, commitment to quality, and personal attention are what make PDMI a publisher that stands alone in excellence.  I’m proud that Annah‘s journey began with them. 

For those of you out there who've read or are reading _Eternity_, you might find it interesting to take a listen to this playlist of songs that grew up as a 'soundtrack' to the unfolding events of that slice of young, post-apocalyptic rebellion. Enjoy--and enjoy the novel!

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list...

When I talk to other writers, particularly other fiction-writers, I nearly always find that music plays a part in their creative process.  I know it’s always been that way for me.  From the time I wrote my first serious attempt at a novel, in high school, a long fiction project has always resulted in a ‘soundtrack’ of songs, some representing settings, elements of plot, and/or characters.  Sometimes, the characters ‘dictate’ song choices to me that I probably wouldn’t make on my own.

In the course of beginning The Children of Evohe series, specifically–Annah is a singer.  The art of her Shaping comes through song, and in fact, the ancestral language of her people takes the form of song– and so I knew music would be important, specifically, to her.  Over the course of writing Annah, I became aware of a young vocalist from New Zealand named Hayley Westenra.  Hayley’s musc isn’t the sort of thing I would listen to on my own, generally, but when I think of Annah’s voice–her singing voice at least–Hayley’s voice is what I hear (speaking voice is another thing entirely).  Here’s a song which is more well-known, probably, from Josh Groban’s version; this version, to me, is a song which might express Annah’s feelings about the First Ones, the progenitors and forgotten gods of her race, in whom she still believes although many don’t.  For those of you out there who read this blog, and are writers, what songs inspire your characters, and you?  Post links.  I want this to be a community, not just a monologue, if possible.  Anyway, here’s Hayley–and Annah.

Before I got the good news from PDMI about Annah, I decided to dip my toes into the pool of self-publishing with a young-adult science-fiction novel called Eternity, a sort of steampunk-rock-n-roll-Orwellian concoction with a black glass city and a cast of teenaged rebels at its heart.  It’ll be available on amazon.com soon.   Here’s what the future looks like.  

Good news!  Annah has been accepted for publication by PDMI Publishing, and will be available on amazon.com and, I imagine, in some fine bookstores near you, in a few months.  Books two and three of the Children of Evohe trilogy, Annah’s Exile and Children of Evohe, are projects of mine right now, and will be on the horizon soon as well.

On Annah’s world, a tradition exists that has faded at the time the novel begins–the art of Shaping, which is the notion of using one’s creative talents–what one does best, and best loves to do–both to connect oneself to others, and to connect others to Spirit/Divinity/Goddess/God/word of your choice.  In the novel, not everyone is a Shaper–or at least it isn’t seen this way.  But then, Annah’s world has some issues when the first novel begins, just as our world does. I do think that in our world, right now, we can consciously choose to use the things we do, the talents we have, to make connections, and to connect others who may feel alone.  And this seems to me to be a pretty damn important thing to do.  No one needs to feel alone, because we’re all part of one another.  And maybe that’s not magic.  But maybe it is

“Essei-khai.”  That means ‘spirit-river” in one of the two native tongues of the people of Evohe, the world on which a great deal of my novel Annah and its two sequels take place.  Essei-khai is the place between lives, where all life originates–and where all dreams have birth.  I’m intending this new blog to be a place to talk about my writing–Annah and the Children of Evohe series of which it is a part, as well as other projects, but also about the imaginative life and things that inspire me.  The word “evohe” is also, I am told, an expression of spiritual ecstasy–and I hope that this can be a place in which the enjoyment of imagination can lead to an enrichment of the spirit as well.  Welcome!