Just a short update this week because revisions are keeping me busy. I passed the 50% mark at 7am today. Acre has surrendered to Richard the Lionheart. The army is making ready to march south along the coast.
I wish I could say it’s all downhill from here but there are many battle scenes or skirmishes yet to come. I wonder how long it takes Bernard Cornwell to write one of his masterful battle scenes? Wouldn’t I love to write even half as well as he does! (I’ll keep practicing. Promise.)
In the meantime, go read Janice Hardy’s critique of the first draft of the opening scene of Battle Scars. Janice does a regular “Real Life Diagnostics” column and I promised I’d share it with you whether good, bad or ugly. I appreciate her thoughts and those of the folks who commented on the post. I can say that I agree with some, but not all of her critique. Some of it aligns with comments from my writers group. There’s still work to be done. You’ll see the results in a few months’ time. And I hope you see some promise in there. 🙂
I’d commented on Janice’s post noting her question about the use of the word “spurs.” I’d found several references but thought I’d add one citation here based on a poem written in the 13th century: The earliest knighting ceremonies included “belting a sword around the waist” however, other rituals were added in the later Middle Ages including the “all-night vigil, the accolade or neck-blow, the bestowal of spurs…”–The Medieval Knighting Ceremony in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Chaucer Review, v.12, no. 3 (1978) by Victoria L. Weiss.
Until next time.
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Image credit: Acre, photo by אסף.צ – used under CC-BY.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/City_of_Acre,Israel(aerial_view,_2005).jpg
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