Book Maps.

[Steel General]

SG ... Ya quit too soon. That's the hardest part.... the rest is all downhill from there... just get through that first chapter of the story and the rest will just fall into place

*OFF TOPIC* Just in case you're interested, here are some things I posted over ar CBG

The White Wolves

The Prize

and some others @ PlotStorming

A Day In The Life

A Father Takes Notice/A New Beginning (2 parts)

[Gandwarf]

Here's what she sent me:


So maybe that gives you an idea...
(In a world.... I keep thinking of that movie announcer guy... lol)

Hmm, my 2 cents: it is well written but a bit vague. The text does feel like a movie announcement... but then you have pictures supporting it. I have no idea what to expect of the story yet.
The concept of humans being the "fantasy creatures" *is* cool by the way.

*OFF TOPIC* Just in case you're interested, here are some things I posted over ar CBG

The White Wolves

The Prize

and some others @ PlotStorming

A Day In The Life

A Father Takes Notice/A New Beginning (2 parts)

Obviously Steel General you are a skilled mapper, but you can also write
I agree with the comments on the first story. The stuff feels like it has all been done before in the fantasy genre, but it's still interesting and well written.

Oh, and I noticed you played Ultima Online. For which I had to rep you

Anyway, back to the normal thread I think, before we stray too far.

[Badger]

We'll work on the summary. It was the first go. Actually harder than I thought to write a summary, never did one for my own book before.... kinda weird too.

Ok, here is another wip... mind you its still rough, and will be tightened up... just added the forest areas and some crusty rock to the outer mountains.

worldmaps_AtD2.jpg

[Steel General]

@Gandwarf - Thanks for taking the time to read that stuff. I agree "The White Wolves" is very stereotypical fantasy, but I wrote it for fun.

@Delgo - Very cool, though it looks like some of your forests got "cut off", or are they only partially finished?

[Ascension]

*Off Topic*
UO. I hope SG wasn't one of those PKs who kept killing me every time I mined some iron ore.

*On Topic*
Sweet as usual.

[Badger]

Ya it's all partial right now.. I"m just m aking the placements, i'll be going back in and outline the forests, fixing the mountains so it doesn't look like I used a pattern, etc... The B&W file however has surprised me at a whopping 305.mb working file... I'm starting to overclock my scratch disk... that last image I had to resize the image before I saved it to web, then UNDO.... I may have to cut it down to 200% .... didn't expect a B&W greyscale to top out that much....

I'm going over to read some of your stuff now

Addendum:
Ya know. I've been lurking at PS ever since I signed up here. I think I might just post the prologue... maybe a an expcerpt or two there, see what the masses have to say about it.... could be interesting.

-- One of the reasons I don't post there is because (you can ask my other half) that when it comes to writing and critiquing written work is that I am critical, brutal and direct. Not out of meaness, but because that is how I want my work to critiqued. Unfortunately, my critiques aren't usually accepted that well in the writing community, so I quit doing that a long time ago. Now I don't critique other's work unless they are some sado-masichist who likes it when someone takes what they've created and proceeds with a blunt hatchet and red pen .

[Steel General]

*Off Topic* UO. I hope SG wasn't one of those PKs who kept killing me every time I mined some iron ore.

Only if you were doing unattended, scripted mining.


@Delgo - Those are the only things I ever posted there, never got much of a response, so I stopped.

[jfrazierjr]

Aye... time and again I've had to stop and make sure things make sense, because i'm so familiar with the world, I write sometimes as if the reader should already know what/who I'm talking about... many times I have had to cut chunks out of the story because the history and flavor just don't move the plot... colorful, yes... but not good for story development...

That did not stop Tolkien... and we all know how that turned out...

[Gandwarf]

That did not stop Tolkien... and we all know how that turned out...

Well, Tolkien's world obviously has lots of depth and flavor. But there's also a pretty fast moving and still epic story I think.

Now take Robert Jordan: in his later books he gets really bogged down, because of all the information he wants to share with his readers and lots of it is not really that relevant. I think one of his books took like 800 pages to describe the events of one day. That's bad
Still I think the Wheel of Time is one of the best fantasy series.

[Badger]

The thing about Tolkien is that they wanted him to cut stuff out... but, how do you tell a man like tolkien he needed to cut this or that out of the story? .... exactly. So that's why it stayed like that.

WoT was something I couldn't get into... and I tried, I promise I did... but as you pointed out Gand, he can bog down a story like nobody's business.

Now ... David Eddings... there's a man (and his wife Leigh) who can spin a tale! .... Belgariad and the Mallorean are together, the best series out there IMHO.

@SG ... Stopped by and read some of your stuff, and honestly I don't think you should give writing up. Like mapping... the more you practice, the better you get, so keep hacking away. Who cares if you get a response over there are not..!! Keep posting them .... you sling enough mud at a wall, some of it is bound to stick sooner or later... (teflon walls excluded of course!)
I don't lurk over there hardly at all (i think my time logged in total is ... under an hour at least) so I don't know how their C&C process goes, maybe they just don't lay into a story and tell you what is really going on. To me, that's the only way to improve, find people who aren't going to hold back what they think cause you might be offended or have your feelings hurt, and get to the nut-cutting...

But don't give up! .... NEVER give up NEVER surrender!