The Job Which Had To Be Done (And I'm Glad It's Over!).
Hello everybody!
The News!
Well, the news is that I've just completed a very tedious edit of my novel, The Symbtiot Awakening. Not an edit in the sense of changing anything about plot, character or scenes, just going through the whole thing in a long slog to improve the grammar. After the euphoria of my sale, I received a slightly damning review which picked holes in my use of English and, while I don't believe in knee-jerk reactions,I nevertheless decided to give the thing a thorough seeing to. It was long, arduous and deeply boring - I mean, unless you are helplessly self-absorbed, how many times can you read your own novel? Still, I think I have improved it somewhat, clarifying many of the passages and adding a LOT of commas lol !
As for giveaways, well, I think I shall probably have one more, now I have produced a second edition, and then call it a day. After all, one does want to make some sales and not just be the book everybody downloads and then leaves to moulder in a sad corner of their Kindle!
My Greek Odyssey!
Yay, Greeks! O.K., so, this week, I finished my Greek cavalry!
I'm really pleased with these guys. As can be seen, Greek cavarly of this period was not really a fighting force for the battlefield, as they were armed only with javelins. In a time before either stirrups or javelins, enguaging in physical combat would have been tricky and in any case horses were not really in the war mindset of the period I've chosed, 460 B.C., when the Persian wars were only grudgingly making the Greeks aware of their use. Instead, they were for skirmishing and would only really make their presence felt towards the latter part of the fifth century, during the Peloponnesian War. The truth was that horse were difficult to rear on city-state Greece's poor soils and the rugged terrian of the land meant that, in a time also before horseshoes, they were not really practical for travel. Also, Greek snobbery tended to demand that you fought your enemy man to man, not chucked something and scooted. Consequently, horses, though revered (Poseidon, as well as being God of the Sea, was also God of Horses) were basically the expensive playthings of the rich, ancient-style sports cars, only useful for showing off at religious festivals and partaking of the sporting events of bare-back horse racing and chariot racing. However, Athens did have a patrol of horsemen in the fifth century, though it is noticeable that they did not bother to field them against the Persians during the Persian Wars. Perhaps, considering the fact that the Persians were great users of the horse and that the few horsemen-rich parts of Greece, Thessaly, Thrace and Macedonia also sided with Persia, it was considered a pointless exercise, rather like putting a one man in goal against an entire soccer team. Either way, cavalry's use in the period was distinctly limited. These fine men are likely to be aristocrats, for the above mentioned reason that only the rich had the spare land for the fairly useless beasts, and are dressed in the flowing Khlamys (or chlamys, if you are, unlike me, normal and go with the Romanised version of the spelling)travellers cloak, which was pinned at the shouler, and two of the horsemen are wearing the broad-brimmed petasos hat. I believe the other guys is wearing a pilados but I am a little hazy on that subject. The man in white and black is lucky or scardy-puss enough to be wearing a muscle cuirass. In truth, I had a little trouble with that. Looking at it, it could be either an old-fashioned bell cuirass or the muscle cuirass necessary for my period and I also had to manually draw in the pteruges, the strips of leather around the base of the cuirass. They are necessary for my period and I would have thought should be there because the pteruges appear in about 475 B.C., which is about the time the Greeks are starting to take cavalry seriously(ish). Either way, they have come out really well so I am happy :D !
My Reading!
Well, my editing bascially kissed off reading this week but I have started a new book, a book on the neuroscience underpinning magic called Sleights of Mind. So far it is a fascinating read and I hope to be able to write more fully on the subject soon!
The News!
Well, the news is that I've just completed a very tedious edit of my novel, The Symbtiot Awakening. Not an edit in the sense of changing anything about plot, character or scenes, just going through the whole thing in a long slog to improve the grammar. After the euphoria of my sale, I received a slightly damning review which picked holes in my use of English and, while I don't believe in knee-jerk reactions,I nevertheless decided to give the thing a thorough seeing to. It was long, arduous and deeply boring - I mean, unless you are helplessly self-absorbed, how many times can you read your own novel? Still, I think I have improved it somewhat, clarifying many of the passages and adding a LOT of commas lol !
As for giveaways, well, I think I shall probably have one more, now I have produced a second edition, and then call it a day. After all, one does want to make some sales and not just be the book everybody downloads and then leaves to moulder in a sad corner of their Kindle!
My Greek Odyssey!
Yay, Greeks! O.K., so, this week, I finished my Greek cavalry!
I'm really pleased with these guys. As can be seen, Greek cavarly of this period was not really a fighting force for the battlefield, as they were armed only with javelins. In a time before either stirrups or javelins, enguaging in physical combat would have been tricky and in any case horses were not really in the war mindset of the period I've chosed, 460 B.C., when the Persian wars were only grudgingly making the Greeks aware of their use. Instead, they were for skirmishing and would only really make their presence felt towards the latter part of the fifth century, during the Peloponnesian War. The truth was that horse were difficult to rear on city-state Greece's poor soils and the rugged terrian of the land meant that, in a time also before horseshoes, they were not really practical for travel. Also, Greek snobbery tended to demand that you fought your enemy man to man, not chucked something and scooted. Consequently, horses, though revered (Poseidon, as well as being God of the Sea, was also God of Horses) were basically the expensive playthings of the rich, ancient-style sports cars, only useful for showing off at religious festivals and partaking of the sporting events of bare-back horse racing and chariot racing. However, Athens did have a patrol of horsemen in the fifth century, though it is noticeable that they did not bother to field them against the Persians during the Persian Wars. Perhaps, considering the fact that the Persians were great users of the horse and that the few horsemen-rich parts of Greece, Thessaly, Thrace and Macedonia also sided with Persia, it was considered a pointless exercise, rather like putting a one man in goal against an entire soccer team. Either way, cavalry's use in the period was distinctly limited. These fine men are likely to be aristocrats, for the above mentioned reason that only the rich had the spare land for the fairly useless beasts, and are dressed in the flowing Khlamys (or chlamys, if you are, unlike me, normal and go with the Romanised version of the spelling)travellers cloak, which was pinned at the shouler, and two of the horsemen are wearing the broad-brimmed petasos hat. I believe the other guys is wearing a pilados but I am a little hazy on that subject. The man in white and black is lucky or scardy-puss enough to be wearing a muscle cuirass. In truth, I had a little trouble with that. Looking at it, it could be either an old-fashioned bell cuirass or the muscle cuirass necessary for my period and I also had to manually draw in the pteruges, the strips of leather around the base of the cuirass. They are necessary for my period and I would have thought should be there because the pteruges appear in about 475 B.C., which is about the time the Greeks are starting to take cavalry seriously(ish). Either way, they have come out really well so I am happy :D !
My Reading!
Well, my editing bascially kissed off reading this week but I have started a new book, a book on the neuroscience underpinning magic called Sleights of Mind. So far it is a fascinating read and I hope to be able to write more fully on the subject soon!
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