Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos · 3 Comments

The Darkening: getting to know the characters – John Piscus

Will anyone read this? Is anyone still alive out there?

My name is John Piscus, and I’m a survivor. The Darkening… I wish I knew more about it, but I don’t. No memory, you see. What I do know is the Darkening claimed the lives of almost every human on the planet by the worst way possible. Stop talking to me! No, no, not you, reader. The two voices in my head. You see, the thing is, I’m crazy. Deranged, mentally unstable, loony, oh yes. Yes, I am, yes, yes, yes. I have two voices lodged in my head. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Two different people talking to me, yapping every single minute of my waking life. One wants me to kill myself, the other to stop at nothing, until as it says, I reach my potential. You think you’re the sole owner of your thoughts? You take it for granted, don’t you? Guess again. You want to make it, to survive? You better make sure you take nothing for granted. Come closer, I want to tell you a secret. Come, come, I don’t bite. Not yet at least. Haven’t turned into cannibalism yet, I’m not like those survivors stuck in what’s left of the cities. Can’t blame them, no food in the cities. But that’s not me. Anyway, here’s the secret; I don’t think the voices are real. No, no, not real. I think one of them is my conscience, the other my survival instinct. Shhh, keep your voice down! They might hear us and start talking to me again. No, don’t ask me about why my conscience has woken. I can’t tell you, I won’t tell you, you can’t make me! Go away! Both of you. Not you, reader. You stay.

What? You don’t know what the Darkening is? Of course, no one left to tell you. The Darkening turned our own shadows against us. No, not shadows, not anymore. What comes out can no longer be called “shadow.” It’s… it’s different. It has substance. It’s alive, malicious, bent on one thing alone; to kill the person it made it. You want to know a fact? It will find you. There’s no escape, there’s no hope. You can’t escape your own shadow. No, you can’t. It’s there, always there. Enough light to cast a shadow, and poof! Your shadow comes to life and you’re dead. Dead, do you hear? DEAD! There’s no escape, there is no hope. Hope is for the weak. Out there, only two things exist; death and fear. You don’t know what fear is, until you realise you carry your own death every step of the way.

The Darkening turned the remaining of us into rats and worms, hiding underground, watching over our backs, constantly looking to the east. If it glows, it kills. No, I will not! My thoughts are my own. Go away! Not you, reader. Anything dark is a good shelter, remember that. If you want to survive, you must have a shelter. Get used to leaving in the dark, for it’s all you’ll ever see. You think it’s easy? Have you ever opened your eyes, and couldn’t tell if anything existed beyond you? Any time where darkness was so pressing, you couldn’t tell if you were awake or asleep? If you had eyes or not? Did you ever stretch you hand in the dark, darkness so thick you thought it had physical substance? That it touched your body, wrapped itself around you, suffocated you? No, reader, you don’t know what fear is until you experience it. You think I’m out of my mind, yes? I am, I told you so. But, you… you don’t know what madness is, until you pry your right to live every single day, not only from the world around you, but from your self. I’m exhausted. So tired. So very very tired.

Shhh! Keep quiet. Did you hear that? I think Raiders are nearby. No, I did not imagine it. It’s Raiders. Can’t you hear them? Raiders! It’s night outside, and they are coming in. Run! They’re inside!

Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos

Status update

Very little is going on at the moment. Heat is picking up and without A/C, I will soon be forced to edit my manuscript on my phone.
I’m a stressful person, and I can’t help but feel that even the smallest delay from my part will be a near-apocalyptic event in the long run. I’ve already been working on The Darkening for a little over a year (gosh, has it been that long? Time does fly, huh?) and I want to hold an edited version in my hands as soon as possible before someone outside myself sees it. Of course that doesn’t mean said edited version will be the final product. Far from it. But I also have two wonderful people waiting to beta for me (once again, thank you both!) and I really really REALLY want to hear their comments, particularly the negative ones, which are vital for my improvement. It will be a milestone of sorts, an indication I’ve actually produced something tangible, and the entire endeavour has moved forward. It will boost my morale. Working at the same novel for so long has made me feel like I’m in a stalemate. Thank God I don’t work on one solid 300 page long MS, but on separate scenes/chapters, each in their own individual folder. That way I get to see every week how much I have progressed. If not for that, I would have been overwhelmed.

OK, enough ranting and raving. Time for me to get back to work.

Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos · 2 Comments

The past 10 days or so

The past ten days or so have been a nightmare, with regards to writing.

Remember my post from a few weeks back when I said I had to delete a plot arc that stretched for 25 or so chapters? I thought once I rewrote these 25 chapters (keep in mind please that my editing process involves rewriting the draft in the first place, so that would be rewrite #2), every piece of the puzzle (for the sake of argument let’s call the puzzle, STORY) would fall into place. And it did. Up to a certain point.

The particular arc I had to remove, however, extended like a ripple in a calm pond. It occurred to me about ten nights ago (once again, just as I was about to fall asleep) that since that arc was out of the way, a certain character’s importance lost its value. Said character was supposed to be the big bad guy (in the original draft that evil character fooled the MC, and lead him right into the wolves’ den). Allow me to clarify something here: the adversary in my story was never that person. The enemy was my main character’s attitude and perception (spawned partly but not limited to his madness – another reason I had to shift the voice and style to more “literary” with more inner thoughts), and the environment which kills humans (the Darkening is a post apocalyptic story, in case you forgot). So the big bad guy was originally there to take my main character to the last location the story would unfold, and all the unresolved plot arcs would come to an end. He served shall we say, as a bridge. Lo and behold, said bridge was also part of the plot arc I wanted to remove. Which made the big bad guy’s existence rather unimportant.

In my attempt to guide my characters from one location to another, I had come up with a weak solution (don’t worry, I paid for it), instead of choosing the most obvious option, though not necessarily the one the MC wanted to take. It was there in front of me the whole time, and all I did was run away from it! DOH!

But I did mention of ripple effects, yes? And that is none other than the big bad guy’s presence. He is no longer needed. He no longer serves as a bridge to take the MC from location A to location B, he no longer deceives the MC of his role. Now all he has to do is just be at location B and be the bad guy, who has his reasons for being the bad guy (if he didn’t, he’d be a very flat character, and we don’t want that, do we?).

So the question I’ve been trying to answer is whether or not I should delete him altogether and how am I going to change the rest of the story. Can the bad guy (who, as I said is NOT the main adversary) have a reason to exist in a story, where he’s introduced in the third act, with such a small role to play, yes or no? To remove him completely would probably mean I would have to change the entire story and plot, which means delete the whole thing. At least that’s what I think. For the past ten days I’ve been trying to come up with patches that would fill in the plot holes the deletion of that one minor plot arc created.

I won’t lie to you, I was on the verge of mental breakdown. I even thought about giving up completely. Add this to a series of rejections for some of my short stories that knocked on my door (or rather came through email) and I certainly did not want to see, and you can understand why I doubted my ability to write.  Even when I step back from the story I still can’t see how it will work in the long run. I don’t want to have a story full of plot holes.

Despite all this, I think (and I stress the word think) I managed to patch things up. The problem is I won’t know until I finish everything and give it to someone else more experienced than me to read it. If I had a kingdom, I’d shout “my kingdom for an affordable developmental editor!” Preferably one that offers free patience lessons along with the feedback. Alas, I don’t.

Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos · 7 Comments

Dreaded point

I have reached the point I dreaded the most. Despite my planning and all the outlining I did a year ago when I started drafting the Darkening, I’ve come to the conclusion that I have to delete part of the plot. I was just about to finish editing chapter 25 (past the midpoint of the book) when I realised that a part of the plot was weak, irrelevant and as such it had to go. Now I have to go back and re-revise and re-rewrite 25 chapters (I’ve been rewriting and revising for the past 4 months, so…), and change some of the causes and their effects that make up the plot, so the project makes sense again. The funny thing is, chapter 25 was supposed to be the place where that particular plot arc would come to an end. What was that you said? Better late than sorry? Well, it couldn’t get any later than that! Actually, it could, but I’d rather not think about it. Remember last week when I said I hoped I’d have the MS ready for the betas by the end of summer or early autumn at the latest? Yeeeeaah…. no.

Anyway, it’s Easter Sunday for us Greek Orthodox, which as far as festive days go, it’s the biggest and most important. I’m off to continue with the celebration 🙂

Posted on by Chris Sarantopoulos

Status update

I’ve been editing/revising my novel The Darkening for a few months now and I’m one chapter short of reaching the midpoint. So far, I’ve rewritten every single chapter. If I was to copy/paste the sentences that didn’t get altered, I doubt they would fill more than maybe two A4 pages. Maybe. So, technically, I’ve spent the last few months writing. Or rewriting, whichever way you want to see it.

It’s really amazing how much my style has changed in just one year, but I think the current version is better. *Chris leans over and whispers in your ear, “much, much better.”* The sentences are tighter, I’ve tamed my former nemesis of constantly using  “as” and “-ing” (but still not as much as I’d like), and the word count has dropped significantly (in some cases by as much as 1200 words per chapter, though I have to tighten it even further). I have also added more of the main character’s mood and voice through the prose. So far, nothing major story-wise has changed.

If everything goes as planned, I should have it ready for my two betas by the end of summer or early autumn. If they have any ideas about the story and other plot changes I should make, I will do them afterwards, during the second round of edits.

Other than that, I’ve started accumulating a few rejections for some new short stories, so I guess it’s business as usual 😛