Day 24: 34,200
I keep expecting other members of the Awesome Cabin to suddenly have a burst of inspriation and catch up with me (or just update their word count and surpass me while looking spectacular).
That being said, I wrote the final scene of my novel today. Now I'm going back over all of it and finding places where my description is shaky or I need to rewrite the dialogue. Before I start each change, I look at the word count and tell myself what I want the word count to be when I'm done.
I wrote almost a thousand words like that before my battery gave out and I had to go plug in. I figured while my battery was charging I should update my word count. (And yes, I chose to stop ot 34,200).
I feel bad, because I am so excited and inspired with A Killer Best Friend, not to mention it's sequel, The Lady Killer. I can't wait to write more of these stories.
When I reach my word goal (or the end of this read through) I'm going to start over again, and this time, I'm going to write a summery of each childhood story that I've shared. Some of them might show up in future books while others may never be seen again.
Now, I have something a little spoilery to talk about, so I'll add a cut here:
About Dominic.
Dominic Highband's family is psychic. This was a decision I made early on to have that element of the supernatural present that I like. The trick to it is, that no one ever actually says that the Highband family has 'special talents.' There are three general catagories with some variations.
The first is touch reading.
I haven't looked up an "official" explination, but for the purpose of my book this has two different strengths.
Inanimate Objects: for a touch reader, handling objects with their bare hands, or even occasionally just touching something with bare skin, can enable them to hear something about the thoughts and emotions of previous handlers.
This is Dom's strength, but he sometimes has control issues which is why he wears gloves all the time.
People: for a touch reader with this talent, they can tell things about people, their mood, and their physical wellness primarily.
This is Damien's strength, and why he chose to become a doctor.
Voice Reading
Again, a two-way ability, voice reading is the ability to 'hear the unspoken' or to convey ideas without actually communicating them. Although all of Dom's siblings have the hearing half, Beatrice's strength is the vocal aspect. (Although it was never confirmed, Dom has theorized that their sister Sam was the one who had the "hearing half" to the extent that she could have been considered telepathic)
Clarivoyent
The ability to see the distant and unseen, the talent claimed and exploited by psychic hotlines. For the Highband family, this ability manafests in variations of a theme.
Dom can "track" people, being able to locate them and know how they're doing. He says he "doesn't do it anymore" because of the Government, which is true. He also avoids "tracking" people because he will never forget how it felt to know someone was dead before anyone else. Dom can also acurately predict the next song on the radio and who is calling his phone.
Damien has a lesser degree of ability, often knowing he'll get a phone call, but not who and the only people he can "track" consistantly is his son Jack and Dom.
Beatrice can pick songs off the radio and predict calls, but doesn't advertise either skill. She can't "track" people, but she always knows who is in her office or home and what they're doing.
Charlie has these gifts in spades. He's been banned from playing games of chance since he was fifteen because of his abilities. He can not only "track" people and check their well being, but he has the kind of situational awareness that Dom wishes he had.
These abilities don't play a major part in my detective stories. They're more along the line of 'party tricks' and such. Dom rarely uses his abilities to help solve cases, mostly, he ignores them. If you want to say something, come find me at dreamwidth.org under the name guardian_of_hope. Everything I post comes from there.