Internet Magic

I'm back from visiting my mom in Texas and buckling down to some actual work on this book. I have a writers retreat in the mountains this weekend, and I hope to make real progress.

I am still mucking with the opening chapter, though I like the way Portier and Ilario are shaping. My rough beginning had Ilario acting too serious and clever - he is a ditzy young lord who carries a luck charm to protect him from crocodiles - and Portier too timid. Portier may be a failure in his chosen profession, but he has been charged with a serious task by his king, and he is smart and determined to make good. (And the king has chosen well!) I also gave these two too much room to get to know each other. Part of the unfolding structure of this book must be my three main characters learning to accommodate one another - or not doing so. Once I got these two guys straightened out in my head, I was faced with a problematical disconnect in the plot.

My opening action has these two new partners approaching a third person, feeling him out to see if he can help in the task the king has set, without revealing anything of the secrets that surround the task. Well, of course it all goes wrong. But the person they approach - a sorcerer - shows Portier something that shakes him. Only this early in the book, I've not laid the groundwork for why what the sorcerer demonstrates should shake him.

So, back up, Carol. How do I lay the groundwork for the structure of magic, the current belief system, its relationship to scientific discovery, etc - all that stuff I worked out week before last? If I do it right, then the reader can feel Portier's wonder when he says,

The green eyes stared at me. Watching. Waiting.
I stared into their fiery depths and felt the entirety of the world crumble.

You see the problem? We have to know what is crumbling before we can feel Portier's astonishment and distress. And this is tough to do so early in the story. So I think I need to stick in another piece.

So far, the king's charge to Portier has been off screen. We don't know what has caused,

the dread that settled in my bowels like Discord’s Worm, gnawing at the heart of the world.

I really don't want to show too much too soon, but if I do and Portier must place this threat within the context of magic, then we'll know what he believes. Thus when I shake him up yet again, we understand.

All of which leads to contrasting magic with science. King Phillipe has called upon someone familiar with magic to solve his mystery. But he embraces science, and gives Portier an example of what he loves - which led me to looking at 17th century scientific breakthroughs - which led me to this online copy of Robert Hooke's Micrographia. To be able to turn the pages of a book published in 1665 on my computer is just wizardly!