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Battling Cerebral Sprawl
Author’s Notes on Retaining Historical Focus as a Novelist
© 2021 James LaFond
FEB/2/21
Nothing is more difficult than yo-yoing as a writer between information emersion in historical research and writing and also emotional emersion in fiction writing. This is a battle that I have waged unevenly and with mixed results over the years, with one novel, Wonderfall, still 20% unfinished after 9 years and wading five years deep into the morass of the Plantation America and Arуas history projects. Once again the cracked pottery finds its fissures widening to crevices, frustrating and failing, so am attempting another imposition on my writing structure.
I haven’t tried a daily schedule so far as I recall. Keeping in mind that I can kick out a short novel in 3-4 days, I think it is doable. Note that my writing rhythm is not reflected in posting. I currently have 43 articles and chapters in 4 categories canned for posting on this site and Lynn, Jamie and Richard have more than that waiting to be posted on their sites. The following scheme is intended to maintain a store of articles in the various categories readers come for and is based on an already existing rhythm.
-1. Monday: reader-writer dialogues, Q & A articles and other directly-posted writing, generally out of my email box to the back end of the site. I will try and save my mailbox for Monday, unless there is a lot built up on Sunday, and then I will use Sunday to address this.
-2. Tuesday: Arуas project, being European myth and history, which includes posts under the tags: A Warrior Be, Destiny’s Exile, Under a Troubled Master-Eye, Upon the Earth, Logos, A Well of Heroes and Red-Face-Island War.
-3. Wednesday: Plantation America, mostly under that site tag, with over half of the content being scheduled for the Patreon site.
-4. Thursday, fiction, start a short novel
-5. Friday, fiction continue a short novel
-6. Saturday, complete a short novel
-7. Flex day: finish overdue completions, “edit” completions and send to editor, outline articles and new projects, address reader queries and letters exceeding five in the email box for Sunday-Monday posting. Emails specifically concerning the Arуas or Plantation America projects will be addressed on Tuesday and Wednesday respectively.
The following schedule should net posting of my oldest forms of writing for Monday, being self-defense and fractional autonomy focused.
My intent is to post a single pre-written article or chapter each day, in addition to posts deriving from reader correspondence and author’s notebook articles such as this and announcement of book completions, linking announcements to podcasts and posts on secondary sites, etc.
When I do travel and miss posting, I will try and post an additional article or chapter for each day I was offline.
Also, in hopes of keying my site posting with my production, I will try and post each day from my pre-written work, articles and chapters of the category I will be working on that day:
So, if I can manage it, posting should look like:
-Monday: Q&A and dialogue with readers
-Tuesday: Sons of Arуas
-Wednesday: Plantation America
-Thursday-Saturday: Speculative crackpot essays and/or fiction
-Sunday: Upon the Earth and sometimes Q&A and dialogue

Note, I no longer go to the comments for writing prompts. That section is for your expression to other readers. If you wish me to address something, email me at jameslafond dot-com at gmail dot-com
Thank you for your patience.
January 2021 Word Counts
author's notebook
What if the Germans Won WWII?
eBook
blue eyed daughter of zeus
eBook
cracker-boy
eBook
barbarism versus civilization
eBook
the fighting edge
eBook
shrouds of arуas
eBook
dark, distant futures
eBook
masculine axis
eBook
on the overton railroad
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