Year of Words: June — Scylla and Charybdis

I’ll keep this one as short as I can: with regards to Pine, I am well and truly between a rock and a hard place: a Scylla and Charybdis, if you will.

The rock — or six-headed man-eating sea monster, depending on which metaphor you prefer — is the inscrutable Part III, an arc with some incredibly limiting factors and a semi-unreliable narrator that make the crafting of it quite a fiddly process. The hard place — or ship-destroying whirlpool, once again in regards to your preferences — is Part IV, which contains a sprawling multi-generational cast set in a cultural region of my world that I’ve never written in before. But never fear, I told myself. There must be other options! Like moving on to Part V, the longest and arguably most anticipated section of the project, which contains lots of detailed arcane lore I haven’t worked out yet. Or going back to Parts I and II, where two jumbled first drafts patiently await complete restructuring and redrafting from the ground up. Ah yes, I thought, there are plenty of directions to sail and be marooned, shipwrecked, or otherwise dashed to pieces.

Needless to say, things have ground to a halt.

This month has been many things: physically draining, with a dramatic change in temperature here, some bouts of sickness and end-of-term fatigue, as well as being incredibly emotionally intense in various directions. So, literally as I’m typing, I’m making the executive decision to put Pine on pause. Not for too long, hopefully, but long enough to get some distance, catch my breath, and return with a fresh perspective.

So what will I write in the meantime? That is an excellent question, which I honestly don’t know the answer to right now. I could try my hand at some of the mini-essay-ish ideas I’ve had floating around for a while, similar to the one I wrote about The Fellowship of the Ring. Or I could go back to Rook, replan and rework a more manageable piece. Or, perhaps, something completely new. I’m running low on energy, so something small would be best.

For posterity, here’s the stats: just over 6000 words this month, with the year’s total now at 53,000. The projected final total now says 110k, which is one of the few things keeping me going on this voyage. But for now, it’s time to lower the sails and follow the ways of the wind for a while. I’ll let you know where it takes me. But until then, fare well, wherever you fare,

— H