Answering Questions, part 2

I am sorry to have taken so long - I started to answer this before the omicron meltdown here - which is still ongoing. For some reason the last three days have been playing air-pressure yoyo, so half the time the sky is sitting on the right side of my head =/ (my son keeps coming downstairs to ask how my head is doing because he also gets air pressure headaches; husband & younger son are exempt, and I am trying not be envious).

At the moment, Ontario is in partial lockdown - no dining in in restaurants, no theaters, cinemas, etc.

Our store is allowed to be open at lower capacity, but for the duration of this snap lockdown, the owner decided for caution, which means we're open for curb-side and mail order (i.e. the employees still go to the store), but not to walk-in browsing.

We also have rapid tests, which are in extremely short supply given omicron, which we are taking before we head into work for the day, because omicron has been much more successful than delta in terms of transmission.

The good news, such as it is, is that omicron - for the vaccinated - does not seem to be as severe or deadly as delta, even with expected breakthrough transmissions, so while hospital numbers are going up, they're going up because an order of magnitude more people are catching it - and the hospital *stays* seem to be a lot shorter, and don't necessarily lead directly to the ICU.

I know it's a silver lining, but at this point, I'll take whatever good news there is.

And now, on to questions:

You asked for questions… 🙂 What’s the worst/most cringeworthy error in consistency/continuity/whatever you call it that you’ve had in your books?OR….Which book on your horizon are you looking forward to writing the most? Why? (if you can without being spoilery)

Of course Leanne would ask this question >.<.

The worst error that I've had in my books is when I used a West Demon name in a CAST novel for a significant character. Hands down.

Also, switching CAST names for the wrong character when I did not realize I had done this. It's the peril of touch-typing. I don't think about the typing at all when I'm writing. I just write - the actual keyboard is invisible to me. So I will make mistakes like the "listened" for "listening" or vice versa.

Second would be eye color. Stephen's eyes (Jody Lee caught that one before the book went to press, because of course she did - she's a visual artist. I ... am not). Severn's eyes. I started a character list because of eye color - but I don't always remember to check it because in the moment of writing, it's not something I doubt. Which... tear inducing.

Third would be scene blocking errors. If I know who is in a room, I know it. But if they hold their peace until further into the chapter, I get queries pretty consistently because I failed to let readers know that the person in question was there. So there's a lot of "inside Michelle's head" failing to reach the actual page.

About six years after I finish a book, I'm a much better proofreader. Sadly, by that point, nothing can be changed - I just find it very hard to disentangle myself from the writing or the intent at the time of writing, and I can very easily fall back into the scene or the book while trying to objectively catch errors.

As for the second question, that one is harder to answer. I am really looking forward to returning to certain places or people in the West novels - but that's less about specific books. Which is to say, I think "next book" I'll be able to write about someone or something, but actually it's not the next book, but further down the road T_T.  So there are things I'm looking forward to (or dreading, depending on the writing day) but they're not as yet specifically wed to a particular novel.

And, if all goes well, I am looking forward to writing a novel set in the CAST universe, which is not a CAST novel, not a Severn novel, if everything works out.

***

My question is if Bredan is not currently on the plane, who are the Hunters and their huntbrothers actually facing during the Great Hunt? How is Bredan (or Old Earth) taking that one death?

I am not sure I can answer this question yet - but wanted to acknowledge it, regardless. What I can say is that the covenant and binding is with the ancient, wild earth, and that that will (in theory; that's the intent) be acknowledged in larger ways as the book progresses.

***

This post is mirrored from https://michellewest.ca/

I find it hard to have a conversation on Patreon, and have created a WordPress Patreon only blog to make it easier for me to find new comments and respond to them, sometimes at length.

This post is https://michellewest.ca/2022/01/07/answering-questions-02/; you should be able to hit Login with Patreon, and should be able to read posts there at the same levels you can read them here.

I'll answer comments here as well if this is your preferred format, but probably not as expansively (which might be a good thing!).