Carter Hall and the Plethora of Prologues

[mrissa]

Last night I wore real clothes and ate real food and spoke audibly. Hurrah for me! Today I am still fighting off the remnants of this virus, but I have it on the run, I'm almost sure. I'm going to be taking it easy as much as possible the next few days, because I am warned that this one can get nasty towards the end. No harm to just a bit more tea and reading under the afghan.

The problem with allowing as how Carter can have a prologue if he wants one is...the same problem with writing anything else with Carter, really. He tends to run away with things. So saying, "Arright, boyo, how does it start?" promptly hands me something like five prologues. I find this excessive. I was not convinced that one prologue was not excessive. Still, when I have brain to do it I am writing them all down, in case I need Carter's Church Of Baseball Hockey Speech at some later point, or Carter's Briefing On Janet And Tam, or Carter's (Completely Wrong) Theory of Why the Queen of Air and Darkness Chose Tam To Begin With, or Carter's (Only Slightly Less Wrong) Theory of Why It's Never The Defensemen or like that. All those things will go in their little files, and maybe for once I will have the "bonus materials" sorts of things people talk about. Or not; it's entirely possible that all the rest of that stuff will go somewhere else in the book than the prologue, or in short stories.

But the thing is, mostly when I write things that get cut in later drafts, they are the wrong things. I look at them and say, "No, no, that's not how it happened," like if one of your relatives was telling a story from your trip to Louisiana only you remembered very clearly that it was when you were in Maine instead. And if the things actually happened and need cutting and redoing, it's because I wrote them badly. So I almost never come out of this whole process (at least so far) with material that is substantially correct as written but does not belong in the final draft. Maybe Carter will do that for me. We'll see.

I am also trying to keep him very thoroughly away from the words "else the Puck a liar call," because I am a bit scared of what will happen if someone lets him at them. And since he, y'know, doesn't exist, someone would have to be me. So. ("Like hell all is mended," says Carter in my head. "Think but this my ass.")

Also, the Wild won, and Cal was back on the ice, and do we regard this as a coincidence? We do not.

Comments

[haddayr.livejournal.com]

Glad you're on the mend.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

Ahahahahaha! Carter calling the Puck a liar! Do it do it do it!!

I'm glad you're feeling better. This disease gig is for the birds.

[carbonel]

Just when I think Carter Hall is totally feckless, he does show a modicum of caution. Occasionally. I'm not sure where he'd fall on the side of calling Puck a liar, though.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

But Puck *is* a liar, and he admits it! Right there! On the stage! So I think he'd probably laugh and buy Carter a beer.

[carbonel]

But he also calls himself "an honest Puck." So it might depend on his mood -- and whether you actually caught him palming that ace.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

No, he says, "as I am an honest Puck," meaning "yeah, here's this ace, wanna make something of it?"

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The thing about Carter and feck or lack of same is that he has had Janet in his life since before he could play in Mites, and he's had Janet's Gran in his life since before he could play in Mites. So he's very familiar with the concept of superior firepower and times when he should maybe shut his mouth, even if he's not always good at actually carrying through with that.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Yay for heartening news!

I did a double take on "else the Puck a liar call," because, y'know, hockey.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah. You're supposed to.

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

I love the Puck line! Use it!

[mechaieh.livejournal.com]

Glad your voice is back.

*glee* at report of more Carter-wrangling.

*Much* power of dark fruits going on in this corner of the world, btw, what with much fruit and darkness everywhere (sundown being around 5 pm and dinner being more like around 8 pm, some wandering around in the dark is inevitable).

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

We are full of fruit and darkness here as well. I am hoping to make an apple crisp tomorrow, but depending on how I'm feeling it might morph into baked apples (less peeling/chopping) or even a trip for ice cream (much less peeling/chopping).

[mechaieh.livejournal.com]

Mmm. Any of those sound good. The BYM and I split an "apple pie" last Thursday that was actually a sort of apple-almond cake, at a cafe-library called "The Little Prince." And earlier today we stopped at a gelato store called "Iceberg" that had flavors such as tangerine-basil, lychee-ginger-pecan, and chocolate-orange.

The juice stores here sell pre-chopped coconut shards and packets of pomegranate seeds. Very convenient - especially when one happens to be sharing a bathroom/kitchen with the guesthouse managers and does not want to use up a disproportionate number of napkins or towels....

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It's astonishing how many of the things in my Big Scando Baking Book translate as "apple pie" and are completely different from each other (and from apple pie as I understand it).

Blackbird Cafe makes a bread pudding with apples and caramel that is really quite fine. Really quite.

Coconut shards are never any use to me, but I'm glad they're of use to somebody.

[mechaieh.livejournal.com]

Not usually a coconut fan myself, but somehow they seemed they would be just the thing with fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice. (As it turns out, they weren't, quite, but they were a satisfactory snack with mint tea a night or two later.)

[brooksmoses]

Right. Apple crisp.

There has been a lack of something in my life lately, and I think that apple crisp might at least help with it. Thank you.

(Why, yes, I realize that was entirely random.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It did not seem random to me. When people talk about forces of light and darkness in the universe, sometimes it makes sense to me and sometimes not, but when there is a baking-shaped hole, that I always understand.

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

We looked better the last time I checked, too or else Ottawa was looking bad enough for us to look good.

That Carter! What can you do with that boy? Or, as we say around here, "Bless his heart, he does go on, doesn't he?"

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I can do nothing with that boy, uff da.

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

Well, bless his heart. You know he's got good intentions.

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

Someday, I am going to be at a con near you and I will fangirl you based solely on what you have given us of this projectthing. And I don't know either hockey or Tam Lin well enough to talk about.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Heh. Well, thanks. You can have some of the stories to read if you want them. Anyway I don't expect people to know either hockey or Tam Lin going into these.

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

I've read the stories, and they made me giggle madly. I'm glad I don't have to really know either source material.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I thought you had, but then you said nothing more than what's here, so I wondered.

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

I had meant to include stories in 'what you've given us' but managed not to. Sorry!