Slightly baffled
Jun. 15th, 2011 03:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elingregoryLast night I discovered M Chandler's The Shadow of the Templar series on Lulu.com at the astounding price of 59p each for the ebooks. I read them aaaages ago online and loved them, so I bought them and made myself dopey by devouring the first 50 pages of the first in the series between midnight and 1am.
What baffles me is why these stories are on Lulu.com at all. They are VERY good fun. Need a bit of an edit maybe and Chandler subscribes to the school of thought [probably started by that dick Elmore Leonard] that one doesn't need to say WHO is speaking because it should be obvious from the context. This works okay with just 2 characters but with a quick fire banter session with six people all having their say it can get confusing. But that apart these are GOOD. Well worth the time of a publisher, I'd have thought. I just hope she gets plenty of sales, she deserves them.
My pirates are growing slowly at the astounding rate of 500 words a day *preens* and there have been relationship developments!!
Here
"Islas Hermanos is an island. Barely that - a long sandbar and some rocks with a scatter of trees," Detorres said.
"There's nothing on the chart." Kit scanned the chart felling more and more anxious. "There's nothing here. Maybe our heading is wrong."
"They may have changed course once we were over the horizon," Valliere admitted, "but they had been holding steady and what would they have to fear from us. The Santiago alone out-guns Africa, but with Garnet as a consort ..."
"Exactly they would have nothing to fear from us," Kit said, comforted for the moment. "And they expect us to sail to the careening bay on Curacao so they will not be expecting us to follow them. Perhaps Denny misheard? Or Islas Hermanos has nothing to do with where they are going?"
Detorres snorted. "Those are English charts are they not? Permit me to point out that the Spanish were here first and you do not know everything there is to know about the Caribbean."
There are Spanish charts in the cabin," Kit said. "Would the island be marked?"
“Possibly," Detorres agreed, "if they are good ones. If they are the ones stolen from the Santiago,” he added with a lift of his chin, “the island will be marked. It got its name, the story goes, from two skeletons found there. One had a sword through his ribs, and was laying across the lap of the other. He seemed to have died of thirst. There was an empty water bottle at his side."
"A prime spot for marooning," Valliere murmured, his lips pinched with worry.
"That's what Jago said," Denny agreed. "When he was talking to - what's his name - he said maroon the bastard and have done with it."
Denny’s impersonation of Jago's voice rang across the deck and followed Kit down to the cabin door. He burst into the cabin, ignoring the yell from the cabin cot, and snatched up the thick roll of charts. Turning he got a good sight of what Lewis and Protheroe were about and he felt his cheeks flame.
"Don't!" Lewis said as Protheroe began to stand up. "You don't want to frighten the lad!"
"Oh for God's sake," Kit mumbled and fled.
What baffles me is why these stories are on Lulu.com at all. They are VERY good fun. Need a bit of an edit maybe and Chandler subscribes to the school of thought [probably started by that dick Elmore Leonard] that one doesn't need to say WHO is speaking because it should be obvious from the context. This works okay with just 2 characters but with a quick fire banter session with six people all having their say it can get confusing. But that apart these are GOOD. Well worth the time of a publisher, I'd have thought. I just hope she gets plenty of sales, she deserves them.
My pirates are growing slowly at the astounding rate of 500 words a day *preens* and there have been relationship developments!!
Here
"Islas Hermanos is an island. Barely that - a long sandbar and some rocks with a scatter of trees," Detorres said.
"There's nothing on the chart." Kit scanned the chart felling more and more anxious. "There's nothing here. Maybe our heading is wrong."
"They may have changed course once we were over the horizon," Valliere admitted, "but they had been holding steady and what would they have to fear from us. The Santiago alone out-guns Africa, but with Garnet as a consort ..."
"Exactly they would have nothing to fear from us," Kit said, comforted for the moment. "And they expect us to sail to the careening bay on Curacao so they will not be expecting us to follow them. Perhaps Denny misheard? Or Islas Hermanos has nothing to do with where they are going?"
Detorres snorted. "Those are English charts are they not? Permit me to point out that the Spanish were here first and you do not know everything there is to know about the Caribbean."
There are Spanish charts in the cabin," Kit said. "Would the island be marked?"
“Possibly," Detorres agreed, "if they are good ones. If they are the ones stolen from the Santiago,” he added with a lift of his chin, “the island will be marked. It got its name, the story goes, from two skeletons found there. One had a sword through his ribs, and was laying across the lap of the other. He seemed to have died of thirst. There was an empty water bottle at his side."
"A prime spot for marooning," Valliere murmured, his lips pinched with worry.
"That's what Jago said," Denny agreed. "When he was talking to - what's his name - he said maroon the bastard and have done with it."
Denny’s impersonation of Jago's voice rang across the deck and followed Kit down to the cabin door. He burst into the cabin, ignoring the yell from the cabin cot, and snatched up the thick roll of charts. Turning he got a good sight of what Lewis and Protheroe were about and he felt his cheeks flame.
"Don't!" Lewis said as Protheroe began to stand up. "You don't want to frighten the lad!"
"Oh for God's sake," Kit mumbled and fled.
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no subject
Date: 2011-06-15 04:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-15 09:49 pm (UTC)I'm glad you're still enjoying it. I'll be happier when I know how I'm going to achieve the climax of the story. The plot has gone a bit woolly.