This chapter marks the real start of a globe-trotting series of chapters. ‘Neuron’ and ‘Imagination’ were more of a continuation on from the events in Hong Kong, while ‘Catalyst’ takes us to a new place, being the Locque equivalent to India. (more…)
I’ve rather let these writing diaries slip of late, due to a rather intense month (entirely unrelated to ADoF). Let’s do some catching up.
Chapter 43, ‘Interlude #7’, concludes the mini-Cal/Holt sub-plot. This kicked off at the very end of Arc 2, and rumbled through Arc 3 in the interludes. At last, here in Arc 4, that storyline meets its ending. (more…)
Read A Day of Faces for free here. Read this specific chapter here. Read all the writing notes here. Every so often I like to shake things up from a structural perspective, so that I don’t fall into a rut of each chapter simply ticking off plot points. That way Read more…
Read A Day of Faces for free here. Read this specific chapter here. Read all the writing notes here. This isn’t the first time I’ve been to Qinhu. I first explored it in a short story for the appendices of the Arc 2 ebook, in which I dive a little Read more…
Read A Day of Faces for free here. Read this specific chapter here. Read all the writing notes here. I’ve been getting rather behind on my A Day of Faces behind-the-scenes posts. Apologies. ‘Paradigm’ marks the beginning of Arc 4, which means it is also the beginning of the end. Read more…
The writing conditions for this chapter was about as sub-optimal as could be. The day had been one of remortgaging phone calls and negotiations, culminating in a one and half hour session online which ended in the bank’s website crashing and losing all the data. (more…)
There’s a lot going on here. This is the tension-building chapter prior to the action finale, and there’s a fair amount of world building thrown in for good measure. Exploring a future-Hong Kong has been great fun.
However, what I want to talk about is a large mistake I made when first publishing this chapter. (more…)
I’ve wanted to write this one for a long, long time. Ever since Cal got his ability this has been on the cards – there was a tiny version of it back in arc 2 when he gives Kay a guided tour of the void, but it was restrained. Interlude #6 takes the brakes off and hints at the potential of a many more stories in the A Day of Faces universe. (more…)
Here we finally get Kay and Simons in a room together when they’re not attacking each other, and it becomes clear that they’re natural allies. Simons is a man in the wrong place, having forgotten what he grew up wanting to do. Kay is barely an adult, but has been forced to confront unpleasant truths and figure out what she’s going to do with them. Together, they’ve got a chance to find proper purpose. (more…)
Pacing in Arc 3 is proving to be a fiddly thing. In the first two arcs pacing was definitely flexible, but on the whole I stuck to the initial chapter breakdowns. With Arc 3 I’m constantly restructuring the story, adding and removing chapters and adjusting the overall pace. (more…)