The Failure of Disney

When the Sequel Trilogy was announced, shortly after Disney had bought Lucasfilm Ltd, fans were all too happy. Finally, the story of the galaxy far, far away would continue! What we got, though, was not something to be happy about. How could Disney take over a multi-million-dollar franchise and destroy any goodwill they had with the fans in such a short time? Where was the failure?

The short answer is that Disney did not understand the franchise they’d just bought.
They saw the money Lucasfilm made with Star Wars through the TV series, the DVDs, Blue-Rays, and downloads, the books, the comics, the action figures, and the licences and assumed that they could make just as much, if not more. And they could have, don’t get me wrong. The exchange in ownership of the IP didn’t cause the fans to grow angry. The announcement of new movies was met with happiness. The movies killed that happiness effectively. Now, the TV series are working on restoring it.
Why did the movies (except for “Rogue One”) kill the happiness? Because they reviled the old heroes, gave us a rehash of the Original Trilogy (OT from here on), and are not a trilogy, despite claiming to be one. A trilogy has at least one plot arc running through all three movies, books, etc. The Sequel Trilogy (ST from now on) lacks that. Rey’s parents are the closest it gets to having one, but that topic is tossed back and forth between the two directors and ends with Rey being a niece of sorts (?) to Palpatine. (As she’s the daughter of his good clone, she’s not really his granddaughter, as a clone should be more akin to an artificial twin brother, so she’d be his niece. Relationships in Star Wars are complicated, what can you do?)
The producers of the ST had no idea what the franchise really was about, they not only dismissed what is now Legends (that was to be expected, to be honest, because it would be impossible to catch the casual movie-goer up on what happens in the roundabout thirty to forty years which have to have passed — imagine putting all of that into the title crawl, it would make the crawl two hours on its own!), they also didn’t really catch up on the canon material. They didn’t understand the characters and neither did the directors and screenwriters they chose! You want angry fans? Because that’s how you get angry fans.

The story itself also has loads of problems, though.
There is no way that the war between the Empire and the Rebel Alliance could have lasted for over forty or so years. The Legends’ solution (a split galaxy) works, as the Empire might be able to hold on to some worlds and keep them under control — others might even prefer the status they gained under the Empire. Yet, thinking that forty years of civil war would not at one point end in a balance of power is weird. Yes, I know Europe had a hundred-year war, but at that time, Europe didn’t have modern weaponry and equipment — and the galaxy far, far away has even better military equipment than that. I (and most other fans) can buy into a ‘cold war’ idea, but not into what Disney gave us.
There also was no reason to revile the heroes of the OT like that. Their character development was essentially undone and they were shown in ways which in no way fit with their character traits. Han has learned not to be all about his own advantages (even already by the end of “A New Hope”), so why is he back to being a smuggler and con-man (something he wasn’t before) all in a sudden? I can buy that his and Leia’s relationship might not have worked out — especially with their son turning to the Dark Side —, but that doesn’t mean he has to become a worse scoundrel than he was before. And then there’s Luke. Honestly, there is no way in Hell Luke would have resorted to trying to kill his own teenage nephew while he was sleeping, no matter what said nephew had done! Luke is defined by a handful of traits and the strongest are his compassion and his kindness. There’s no way he’d resort to cold-blooded murder (even though we all know a teenager can easily make you contemplate murder…).
Instead of reviling them and then killing them off, another easy solution would have been for them to be mentors or superiors in a way. At the age they were in the story, they’d have learned the lesson of leaving adventures to the younger ones and stay in the background for assistance. No reason to go out and fight evil on your own if there’s a group of trained Jedi you’ve got at your fingertips — and a Jedi should see the wisdom in that…

I also love the Emperor as much as the next Star Wars fan (or a bit more, I’m the ‘I love the villains’ type of person) and I certainly appreciate every time Ian McDiarmid steps forward and dons the robes again. That man has breathed a lot of life into what could have become a caricature otherwise. Well, to a degree the Emperor is a caricature, but a great one. Best villain ever. Yet, bringing him back for the end of the ST was not a good move. I am aware that Legends did that, too, with the “Dark Empire” story line. That one, however, was set about ten years after “A New Hope” — it seems much more likely that a clone would have stayed hidden that long. Doing it forty years later is over the top and not a good idea at all.
I’m also not going into the whole Ben Solo topic. I’d go into a rave that starts with Leia never calling her son ‘Ben’ as she knew Obi-Wan under his real name and ends with Ben being a failure as a Dark Lord — unlike the Legends character he’s modelled on: Darth Caedus aka Jacen Solo. Enough said about him.
Instead, why not use a child or grandchild of the Emperor for that? In Legends, there was a host of descendants of Palpatine around, although most of them lacked the hunger for power which drove him all the way to the Emperor position. Having a handful in canon would be easy enough. Rey is one of his descendants, why not put up a Big Bad who is related to her? That could have cut out Snoke completely and given us a strong enemy she has to prepare herself to fight. Or made Snoke a smokescreen the real ruler hides behind — also nice.

Instead, Disney gave us three disjointed movies which are definitely not a trilogy with two directors going at each other over their decisions. The Prequels gave us Jar Jar Binks, which was worse enough, but the way the ST deconstructs all that is fun and good about Star Wars is by far worse than that. Jar Jar is one character that could easily be cut out. The ST is a catastrophe that should never have happened. Disney didn’t understand the franchise and didn’t want to invest in directors who did. Now they are doing an about turn by relying on directors with prior experience for their Disney+ series — and it works. Hopefully, they’ll one day banish the ST into another ‘alternate universe,’ as they did with the Extended Universe (now Legends), and make a proper new trilogy.

Call of the Jersey Devil Review

I’ve stumbled over a lot of interesting and fun books by coincidence in my life — sometimes I’ve even found much-beloved authors that way. With this book, though, it was even more strange than normally.
I was actually looking for Aurelio Voltaire on Amazon, but not for him as an author. I was looking for his newest album, “The Black Labyrinth”. Instead, the first hit for the name was a novel, “Call of the Jersey Devil”. It had a pleasantly pulpish cover and so I looked into it and put it on my wish-list. The next day, I decided to buy it, as the e-book wasn’t expensive and I had time to waste, and I could barely put it down to do my duties during the day.

“Call of the Jersey Devil” first got me interested by the wordcraft I experienced from the very first page of the ‘look inside’ feature.
It is only to be expected, I guess, that a singer and songwriter like Voltaire would have the necessary skills to write an engaging scene, yet the wording he used was evocative and powerful and also very, very pulpish. It is also to be expected that someone who delves into the dark side of things in his songs can also write good dark scenes in prose. As I love pulp, the writing was right down my alley. Even though the story starts with a scene set in the past, this scene is also definitely setting the stage, presenting a visceral fight between good and evil, monsters and murder, and a suggestion for what the future might hold.

“Call of the Jersey Devil” is a horror novel and I am sometimes weary of those, as they often include body horror and I’m not generally a body-horror type — I usually prefer psychological horror.
In addition, I do like a balance between darker and lighter scenes, which not all horror stories offer. To me, it’s important to be able to unwind at a few points so I can be properly tense and scared again afterwards. “Call of the Jersey Devil” definitely delivers on this. There are dark and horrid scenes, there’s body horror, and the writing is visceral and very evocative throughout, yet there are also scenes of dark humour which help me relax and get ready for the horrors that await me, so I can properly experience them.
Those scenes also all offer much-needed windows into the souls and pasts of the characters, giving me more reasons to care for them.

Given the pulpish tone of the story, I was also surprised at how well-rounded the characters became over the course of the book.
They started out a little stereotypical, but they gained depth and individuality over the course of the story. Of course, most of them did not survive to the end (although in one case, ‘survive’ is debatable), but that is a given in a horror story. Yet, I cared for them, which made their eventual demise by ghouls, the Jersey Devil, or other forces all the more engaging. It’s easy to see a whole crowd of nameless, faceless stereotypes die and another to see people whose lives’ woes you know go down and be changed into something horrid (or land the worst gig in eternity).
I also love how some horror-story stereotypes were reverted in the book, especially who is allowed to see the end.

The novel does have quite some body horror, from decapitation right up to slowly turning into a ghoul, but it does its job well. I am a little suspicious of body horror most of the time, as most of it only seems to be there for the mere gore factor and not really to drive the story, yet here it is used fittingly.
A character who is defining herself by her beauty (because that is what she learned from her own mother) slowly finding her perfect skin being tarnished with boils and other blemishes, her body bloating from the quick decomposition, her beautiful hair falling out, her face becoming hideous, that is horror. Even though I myself am not defining myself through beauty, I can understand what it would be like to see that shift happening in minutes, turning into a monster, losing your identity and your past, becoming nothing but a blind, ever-hungry creature of Hell.
The book’s excellent wordcraft only enhances this and similar scenes by the visceral and evocative words used — putting pictures in my head which only enhanced the horror of what was happening. It takes a lot of talent to do this and Voltaire pulled it off in his first-ever novel. He has, of course, done it in many songs beforehand, so perhaps I shouldn’t be that surprised.

The pacing of the novel is excellent as well. There are twists and turns in all the right places, the comic-relief moments are frequent, but short, and only make the next rise in tension all the more palpable.
That is the main reason why I couldn’t put “Call of the Jersey Devil” down. The pacing gave me the moments of rest and relaxation when I needed them and then got me engaged in the story again by showing me the next horror, the next monster, the next problem and how the characters reacted to it — sometimes wisely, sometimes less so.
Together with the excellent wordcraft and the well-rounded characters, it was neigh-impossible to put the book down and I finished it within a day. While that is not unheard of for me, it’s been a while since a book engaged me that much and made me want to pick it up or go on reading while there was other stuff that really, really needed doing.

If you like horror stories and pulp, “Call of the Jersey Devil” by Aurelio Voltaire should definitely be on your ‘to read’ list. It’s well-written, has interesting characters that grow on you, paces itself very well, and also gives you a little window in the past of the author himself (since nobody can tell me that has-been Gothic singer Villy Bats has nothing to do with him, even though I wouldn’t call Voltaire a ‘has-been’). Give the story a chance if you can stand more visceral horror stories, I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.

Scrivener Experiences

It’s been well over a year since I switched from MS Word to Scrivener now, so I think it is a good idea to talk about my experiences, about what I think of the program now that I’ve used it for quite a while — and for everything from plotting to writing to editing to doing my blog posts. Yes, this very blog post, like all for the last year, was written in Scrivener. This should, of course, already give you an inkling of how I feel about it. I would hardly have stayed with the program for so long if I hated it. I still do have Word, I could always go back — but I won’t.

Before I dip into the meat of it, though, I want to start with an aspect which has nothing to do with the program as a such, but all with the mindset of the people behind it: the 30-day trial period. A lot of programs have something like this, giving you the chance to try out the full program, not a limited demo version, for thirty days before you need to decide whether to buy or not. Yet, the makers of Scrivener go the extra mile here.
Generally, a 30-day trial works like this: you install the program and this is day one of the trial period. Every day which ticks by lowers the number of days left by one, no matter whether or not you get to make use of the program. Say you install the program on a Monday, then this Monday is day one. On Tuesday and Wednesday, you’re doing other things and have no time to work with the program. On Thursday, you get around to it again — and three days have ticked by, you are now on the fourth day of the trial. Depending on how your life is going, half or more of the trial period might tick by without you being able to really try out the program.
For Scrivener (and the whiteboard software Scapple by the same people), it’s different. You install the program and this is day one like in the case above, but it changes afterwards. The day-counter of the trial only counts days on which you have actually opened the program. In the example above, it would work like this: You install Scrivener on a Monday, so Monday is the first day of the trial and there’s twenty-nine left. On Tuesday and Wednesday, you don’t get around to opening Scrivener because there’s a lot of other things to do. On Thursday, you open Scrivener and you’re on day two of your trial period with twenty-eight more ahead. With Scrivener, you get thirty actual days of trial — not that I needed them, I bought the program after trying it out for about two days. Yet, if you tried it out next NaNoWriMo, for instance, you could do your project in Scrivener without buying it at all.

I also love the way the projects are organised in Scrivener. Instead of one big file that could become corrupted (I did originally change to Scrivener because some of my projects in Campfire Pro had become corrupted), you have a folder with sub-folders and files to work with. All files are in an .rtf format which means they can be read with every kind of editor, even the simple Windows notepad, so even if the Scrivener file should become corrupted (not that it happened to me in over a year now, even with the big ones), you can still access your files and can incorporate them easily in a new project if you wish.
In addition, you get a backup whenever you want to, as you can set both when a backup is made (upon opening, upon closing, or at a certain time of the day) and how many backups you want to keep. You can even send your backups into a cloud save automatically which really keeps them safe, of course. Then there’s the fact that the program automatically saves your project after changes are made. You can set how long after you stopped typing this happens, but it always will and that means no thinking about ‘when did I last save my stuff?’
I also love how all of your files and folders are available within the program through the binder space. It’s so easy to switch between different scenes, to bring up notes or research material you have gathered, to fill out the bible I keep for each of my series like that. The binder gives me the chance to see everything at a glance while the file-and-folder structure allows for me to split up my stories into scenes which are easily found, read, or moved when need be. It’s much better than having to work with one large file in Word or having to keep several windows open at the same time because I need to reference different parts of a project.

One of my more recent discoveries is the composition mode which I have ignored for most of the year, working in the regular Scrivener window. There’s nothing wrong with that, mind, but having the composition mode where everything else is pushed in the background and you have a large space to write in with the typewriter mode automatically activated is much better.
Composition mode can be started and ended by pressing a key, although I usually use the icon in the Scrivener window to start it — yet, I usually end it with the escape key. Dropping into and out of it, therefore, is really, really simple and fast.
I’ve found this a pleasant way to write, especially long passages, such as full scenes and chapters. For short writing, or writing while I have to consult my notes a lot, I use the regular window — most of the time, that is. Composition mode helps me focus and makes doing my writing much easier.

Compiling in Scrivener isn’t easy. That is a simple fact. The compiler is a powerful tool which can create files in a lot of different formats and powerful tools are rarely easy to use.
I’ve needed my time to get more familiar with the compiler and I still have situations in which my files (normally .epub) don’t come out the way I want them to. It has helped, however, that I have made myself my own release format which is saved as a general format and also as an external file I can put up again, should I be forced to move between computers again (as I will be in a couple of years, I guess, but not any time soon).
By now, most of the time I get what I want when I compile a story. I still check them with the Kindle Viewer to see if they’ve been formatted the way I wanted them to, but I rarely see surprises.

Overall, I’m glad I’ve switched to Scrivener. It was hard work to bring all my projects to the new program, but it has paid off. I have found a program which is better suited for my work. That doesn’t mean that Word is a horrid program — for the office applications it was meant for, such as writing business letters and reports, Word is pretty good. I never had a problem with extremely long files (one of my Knight Agency novels has over 100,000 words), either, not on the technical side. Yet, I am a writer and not a businessperson and I’m glad I have a program which was made with someone like me in mind. A program that’s an ‘all in one’ solution for a writer, letting me keep all I need in one place with easy access. If you’re uncertain, check the program out, it might work for you as well — and it has a very fair trial period, too.

The End of Year Post

2022 is drawing to an end, so it is time for a proper ‘end of year’ update. This is not just about looking back, though, but also, perhaps even more, about looking forward to 2023. The past is solidly written in stone, after all, while the future is merely sketched into ever-changing sand. I do know what happened this year, but I do not know what will happen in the next. Therefore, I can and will speculate about it. I do have plans, as that is my nature. I always have plans, captain. (I must keep this one in mind, sounds like a good one-liner for a villain…)

For me personally, 2022 was a rather stressful year — and so it obviously was for the world as well, what with the remainders of COVID clinging on and the war in Ukraine and too many other fires burning to name them all here. This has led to my sabbatical during November and December. I needed the rest and I feel much recovered now after two months of doing just what I want and working on my own fan projects. After all, I plotted and finished two long Star Wars fan-fiction novels and a set of three short stories about the same characters.
From now onward, I’ll be careful to give myself breaks throughout the year, just a week or two here or there for my own projects and for gathering new energy and inspiration. Perhaps I’ll make use of my release months for that — I need about half the month for revisions and editing and can then use the other half for relaxation. After editing, I’m usually very ready for some relaxation, anyway — it’s my least-favourite part of writing and self-publishing.

I may take part of January off as well, even though I’m not quite certain about it right now. I will see what the next days bring and how I feel about returning to “Scholomancer” now. Releases will definitely resume with “The Necromancer’s Notebook”, the second volume of stories about Isadora Goode, in February. My release schedule has shifted by one book like this, which means I already have all the manuscripts I plan to release during 2023 written and do not have to worry about my releases this year. That should also help with overtaxing or stressing myself out.
The schedule for 2023 is as follows: “The Necromancer’s Notebook”, February, “The Lady of the Dead”, May, “DI Colin Rook”, August, “Changing Plans”, November. That’s one set of novellas, two sets of short stories, and one novel.

As far as new projects go — well, I do have plenty plotted out already. I could write one book every month of 2023 (which is unlikely) and I would still have some left over. That is only if I do no plot out anything new — as I certainly will. Therefore, finding something to write shouldn’t be difficult, I have a lot to choose from. There’s a lot of different stuff, too, from my Lovecraftian “The Crew” over the Cultivation novel “Shadow and Sun” to much lighter fare such as “On An Adventure”. I will definitely get back to all of it in time, but I have no order planned out right now. I will write the stories as I feel like it.

I’m sure I caught myself just before I could develop another burn-out. I’ve had one a little less than ten years ago and I’d rather avoid another, so one of my personal goals for next year is not to overwork myself again and accept that I might have to set aside writing for a little while when my life gets overwhelming in other ways, as it did this year. The last thing I want or need is being burned out again and hardly being able to do anything. Burn-out and depression are horrid conditions and having the lighter of them once was plenty already, thank you very much.

To a good 2023, an end to the war in Ukraine and the oppressive regime in Iran, and more focus on the long-term problems of the world! For me personally, I want a calm year without medical or other emergencies and the chance to simply concentrate on my writing and, perhaps, projects like creating 3-book collections of my past stories or my own website. Have a good 2023, everyone!

On Self-Publishing

Self-publishing still has a bad reputation. It’s something to feed one’s vanity. It’s clearly ‘lesser than’ being published by a proper publishing house. It’s not something a serious author would do. While this used to be true in the past, at least to a degree, modern means of publishing — including self-publishing — have opened up new avenues for books to reach their readers. Self-publishing is better than its reputation (and then there’s the topic of indie publishing, too).

Some authors choose self-publishing to keep control over their work. The moment an author signs a contract with a literary agency or a publishing house, they do lose control over their manuscript and that can be really bad.
Usually, contracts leave the author little influence as to where, when, and if the book ever sees the light of day. The literary agency chooses which publishing houses to offer the manuscript to. The publishing house decides on when and how to publish the book, usually sets the genre and sub-genre, may make severe changes to the text and change the title. The cover might severely misrepresent what the main character is supposed to look like or give people completely wrong expectations of what the book will include.
Yet, in the end it is the author who gets blamed for all of this — it’s their book, after all, and their name is on the cover. An author who has been through this, perhaps even several times, might choose to self-publish or indie publish instead and keep control of their manuscript.

Some authors self-publish because their book is part of a niche market. Big publishing houses usually do not serve the niche markets and the only way to get the book out can be to self- or indie publish it.
Publishing houses have only one interest: to make money with their books. This means that they’ll be on lookout for possible future bestsellers. They look for books similar to what they already publish, similar to what sold well in the past. While this might be short-sighted, it’s how the business works. Well-known authors with a lot of bestsellers under their belt are wanted — and often can take more influence on how their book will look in the end. New authors who are focused on the same audience as other best-selling authors also have it easier to be published, because the publisher expects that their book will perform similarly well.
Everyone whose book is written for a more niche market, on the other hand, stands little chance to get published that way. The niche market doesn’t turn a lot of profit, the publishing house might not even want to be connected to it (such as a conservative publisher not wanting to publish homosexual romance stories). Self-publishing or indie publishing are the way out and bring those books to their niche audience, enriching the book market.

Self-publishing is also a lot of work. It’s not just about writing your manuscript and all is done.
After writing, the first step is usually editing the text. This can and usually will include content editing, copy editing, and line editing (as I have no printed versions of my books, I do not line edit, but I have to do the other two). Content editing is looking into the content — making sure that there are no illogical parts in the story and all threads are tied up nicely in the end (or as nicely as is possible in a series). Content editing might include rewriting big parts of a text, especially for discovery writers. Copy editing means looking for typos, wrong words, and every kind of grammar mistake. This is usually the most tiring process, as you need to go over the text several times to be sure to catch them all (or at least most of them). Line editing, finally, happens once the printing is organised and gives the editor (in self-publishing, the author) the chance to make sure that there are no widows or orphans (single last or first lines on the page belonging to a longer paragraph) and, ideally, no chapters ending with one or two lines on a new page. As said above, I do not do the last one myself, as I’m not self-publishing in print so far.
Writing a blurb is the next step, so there is a way to advertise the book to the reader on the platforms on which it can be bought. This is something entirely different from writing a story — this is advertising and needs a new skill set.
A book needs a cover, so then it’s about creating a cover for your book. This might be easier if you have a series going and have kept a template, but it still needs work every time you want to put out a new book. Design is also a different skill set from writing a book.
After all of this is done, the next step is to actually put the book online. I personally put my e-books up at Amazon and use Draft 2 Digital for the rest. By now, D2D also does Amazon as a platform, but I don’t want the work of pulling all of my books from my Amazon account to re-upload them through D2D. This can take quite a while, depending on how well your program can format and what way you upload. I personally am quite happy I can upload the .epub format after making it with Scrivener by now.
After this, there’s still advertising to do (also not a regular skill for an author) and a website to keep working and updated these days. This is something I have to look into again, as my Google-sites website just doesn’t really cut it.

The difference between indie publishing and self-publishing, by the way, is that most of the steps above are done by hired professionals if you have the money to do indie publishing instead. Like this, the author doesn’t need to learn all the other skills, but they have to pay people who have them.

In the modern day, self-publishing is no longer just a vanity project. It can be, but it’s much less likely to be one these days than it might have been in the past. There are good reasons for self- or indie publishing. The author can keep control of their own manuscript and make sure it is not advertised wrongly or changed beyond recognition. The author can write for a niche market which the publishing houses ignore. It’s a lot of work — or costs a lot of money —, but it is perfectly viable and can be the best choice for any and all manuscripts.

Character Arcs

Character arcs are important. That’s something which basically every bit of writing advice will tell you. Yet, which character can or should have a character arc? Which character absolutely needs one and for which character would it be a waste of time? Let’s find out.

Generally speaking, the main character, the protagonist, the hero, should always have a character arc.
Always? Okay, superhero comics and pulp stories usually get away with not giving them an arc, mostly because everything is set back to zero at the end of every story — that goes for deaths, romantic developments, and also all other kinds of character arcs. It’s not that it is forbidden, it’s more that it’s not considered necessary. Pulp and comic-book heroes usually are developed enough for their adventures and don’t need to find new skills or associates to master them. Hence, there is no need for character development. It could be there — and, sometimes, it is —, but it’s not necessary to make the story work.
Classic character arcs for the hero are usually upward arcs — arcs that make the character a better person. They can include — but are not limited to — overcoming fears and other flaws (such as more undesirable character traits), building a new relationship, or developing a new skill. Romance arcs, for instance, are usually all about building a relationship and can include overcoming a flaw so the relationship has a future.

Love interests are another group of characters who often do get a character arc — also an upward one which makes them ‘better people’ in the long run. This is especially true if the love interest is male and falls into the ‘brooding’ category.
A full character arc for the love interest, though, is more likely in a romance-based story and less likely if there’s just a romantic sub-plot somewhere. In the romantic sub-plot, the main plot often provides the reason for the couple to get together in the end, even if it might feel ‘unearned’ from the protagonists side.
What should be avoided is turning the female love interest from a confident and able woman into a helpless damsel, just so the male main character can save her and ‘win’ her that way. There are other, better ways to bring two people together than making one the passive trophy to be ‘won’ by the other.

The last big group of characters who might get a character arc are — the villains! Yes, villains can have two different types of character arcs.
More commonly known is the redemption arc in which the villain stops being a villain and becomes one of the good people instead. Good redemption arcs are hard to do, though, and quite often they include the death of the villain — after doing something for Team Good (think of Darth Vader, for instance). Others take the longer, harder route and give us a full redemption with the villain turning hero (a great example would be Prince Zuko from “Avatar: The Last Airbender”).
What if the villain is not supposed to be redeemed? No arc at all then? No, for this case, there’s still a possible character arc — a downward one. A downward arc is the opposite of the upward one — instead of making the character a better person, it makes the character a worse person. The character commits more and more atrocities and proves themselves to be someone who can only be vanquished — and possibly killed — and never redeemed.

In addition to these three groups of characters — hero, love interest, and villain — some other characters might get a character arc of some kind. The most common two would be the sidekick and the mentor.
A sidekick could come into their own over the course of a story — which would set them up as a possible main character in the sequel — or at least lose a bad trait or gain a good one. Their arc usually isn’t as strong as that of the main character, but it might still be there and enrich the story.
Even though the mentor is normally the one giving life lessons, some of them still have something to learn. “Kung Fu Panda” has mentor Shifu learn that sometimes his regular methods of teaching might fail while different ones might yield results when he finds out that food is a good motivation for his new student to give his best. Shifu goes with it and thus trains the new Dragon Warrior successfully.

Character arcs are often referred to as ‘internal arcs’ in opposition to the main story arc which is usually an ‘external arc.’ This simply refers to whether or not the arc is mostly driven by visible action. Taking the One Ring to Mordor is an external action and this is the main arc of “Lord of the Rings” whereas Frodo’s development as carrier of the ring is mostly internal as the One Ring influences his character.
A story needs an external arc so there is something happening, so there’s tension and stakes. It might or might not have an internal arc for any and all of the main characters. Even romance stories need that external arc, which is often about overcoming an obstacle on the way to the ‘happily ever after.’

Character arcs are important for main characters like hero, villain, and love interest. All of them can profit from a good character arc that makes them visibly grow in some way (even if it might be growing worse in case of the villain). Some other characters might profit from a character arc as well. That doesn’t mean that ‘henchman 275’ or that merchant who sells the hero some provisions also need a character arc. Before you give someone a character arc, ask yourself whether it will enrich the story or not. If it does, put it in. If it doesn’t, leave it out.

Taking a Sabbatical

You might already have noticed that I haven’t been writing any blog posts lately (for a little over a month now to be more precise). I’ve found myself almost burned out after the year I’ve had so far and I’ve taken a sabbatical to recover. That did include abstaining from my blog and doing the mere minimum (mostly set up before the sabbatical) for my Facebook page.

My real life this year has been hard — my dad was diagnosed with stomach cancer at the end of the last year and went through several surgeries and a stint of chemotherapy from January to September. I didn’t go through all the physical parts of this, naturally, but there was a lot of work to pick up and a lot of care going on as well. Not that I’m complaining — I’m glad I could help him. Only … it doesn’t lead to a lot of spare time for writing and editing and doing all the other stuff which needs doing if you’re a freelance writer.
I forced myself to go through all of it, releasing a new book in February (when my dad had major surgery), May (when his last surgery was just finished), and August (when he was in the middle of his chemotherapy). I simply had no strength left in November, so “The Necromancer’s Notebook” will be released in February next year. I can live with that.
I also pushed myself with writing until I barely could bring myself to go on, despite being all geared up for the stories I wanted to write. Strangely enough, when I re-plotted and rewrote an old Star Wars fan-fiction in October, I was burning for it. I was putting in two chapters a day, Monday to Sunday (I normally take the weekends off from writing). I wanted to finish this and I did — only to continue with part two right afterwards. I wrote into November, pushing the time at which I would start editing — until I realised I didn’t want to edit. Well, I never want to edit, but this time, I just couldn’t find the energy, so I decided ‘no editing and no releasing this month’ and I was all the better for it.

Yet, what this has shown me is that I can write. It’s not that I have lost the ability to really finish a writing project, it’s just that right now I can’t be bothered with commercial projects and need to find my way back to my love of writing and telling stories. That is what my sabbatical will be for, recovering the fun of writing and getting more motivated again.
I will try to get back to regular writing in January — it might take longer, I have two fan projects in the pipeline and they might take up the time until towards the end of January. Even so, I can also start anew in February after the editing. Editing usually motivates me to write more.
I find myself looking forward to writing more already, which is a good sign. I want to write again and I want to tackle a project. I enjoy myself at the keyboard (and I’ve grown fond of Scrivener’s composition mode, too, but more of that at another time). My sabbatical is definitely going in the right direction and that is good.

So far, I’ve only pushed my release schedule back by one book — shifting “The Necromancer’s Notebook” which has been written quite a while ago from November to February.
It’s not as if I was missing out on enormous sales numbers, either. I make little money with my books so far, although it’s getting better. It’s not as if there’s troves of fans who are crying themselves to sleep at night because the book isn’t out yet (although I can say that it’s fun).
It’s also that I wasn’t so much not looking forward to editing the book — I do like the stories in this novella collection and I do like Isadora very much — , it was that I just couldn’t find the motivation to start with it at all. Normally, I can at least tell myself ‘it has to be done and the sooner you start, the sooner you’ll be done,’ but not this time. This time, I couldn’t motivate myself at all.

I’ve had a burn-out before, too, and I didn’t want to get down to that again — once was one time too many.
Therefore, I hit the emergency break and got off before it could get to that point. I’m getting better and that is good. I need this time, so I’m taking it. If other authors can publish a book every five years (or so), I can publish three books a year instead of four every now and then.
The last time, by the way, I didn’t publish four books, was when my mum lost half her lung to cancer. I find that real life and family take precedent over my publishing business. Deal with it.

Blog posts might not be quite as regular for a while longer now, but I’ll try to get some up. I actually have three more of them plotted and can write them. I might also take the time to do so before I return to my Star Wars fan-fiction and give my characters a new adventure with less Sith and more investigation. I’m enjoying my sabbatical after several years of basically no breaks and I will return to work when I have recovered enough. Luckily, I have the freedom to do so.