Month: May 2020

Musings

[Blog] Plans and Progress!

Faith Hakimian

So, the other day I was chatting with my sister/writing buddy, and I started explaining my general premise for The Dalton Job. And, to my surprise, I found that I actually did a relatively good job at explaining it, complete with a few details and the basic gist of the plot. And to my even greater surprise, I didn’t finish and feel like the whole thing was more plot hole than actual plot.

It’s a high bar, I know. But honestly, I’m really excited. Because a bunch of what I was talking about was stuff I’d been grappling with for some time that didn’t seem to quite make sense. I’ve still got a long ways to go, of course, and a basic plot treatment that doesn’t shriek inconsistencies is a long, long way from a complete book, but it’s definitely progress. And that’s nice to see.

“I love it when a plan comes together.”
Fiction (Excerpts)

[Excerpt] Tanner and Miranda

Faith Hakimian

All things considered, the Duster Gang’s hideout was one of the best ones I’d seen. For one thing, they hadn’t set up shop in the Outlands, and I appreciated the change of scenery. For another, the panoramic view of the valley was truly impressive, and made moreso by the clear and cloudless sky: unless I missed my guess, that smudge off to the southwest was Coville itself. But the best part was the water.

There was a whole pool of it in the deepest part of the cave: cold, sweet water. As soon as Tanner and I saw that, it made sense how the eight scruffy miscreants we had tied up and disarmed in the mouth of the cave had been able to run their cattle rustling outfit for as long as they had. It was one thing to have enough water for a handful of people. It was another entirely to be able to keep twenty or thirty head of stolen cattle in good condition while you waited for a chance to sell them off.

Musings

[Blog] Morning Person

Faith Hakimian

I am not a morning person.

You’d think I would be, by now. Goodness knows I’ve had more than enough opportunity for it. Heck, even as far back as high school, we got up at 5am five days a week so we could do our chores and then go into town with our dad. And these days, I work shifts that start at 4am (or 5am when I’m lucky), which means my body has resigned itself to believing that 3am is a sensible wakeup time.

But I’m still not a morning person.

The truth of the matter is that despite the blatant impracticality of it, I still prefer staying up late as opposed to getting up early. Late night tends to be when my brain is most happy to be doing things like writing, and I haven’t managed to get it to work quite as effectively in the early morning. But perhaps I have a chance. Perhaps it just has to do with practice, and maybe I just need to retrain my mental habits.

Or maybe I’m just not a morning person.

Perhaps we’ll never know.

Fiction (Excerpts)

[Excerpt] The Dalton Job

Faith Hakimian

Somehow, I managed to avoid venting my spleen until after we were out of Kemp’s earshot. Or until I thought we probably were. Or could argue to Tanner that I thought we were when it turned out he heard us—or rather, me—after all, and it came back to bite us. Not that he didn’t deserve every word I said, of course, but working with a butthurt and testy ranger would just be working for trouble.

So, I waited until we were out of earshot. Probably. And then I let loose with nine hours worth of frustration and righteous annoyance.

“…and he’s probably just working as a ranger so he can get filthy rich,” I finished. It didn’t sound right even as the words left my mouth, but I didn’t particularly care.

Tanner raised one eyebrow. “I’ll ask Paul next time we see him how that’s going for him.”

I glared at him. He would derail a perfectly good rant with a quick dose of logic.