I’m putting the finishing touches on The Ship from Wolfskill. I’ve been editing/revising the book, and it’s ready for publication. My wife, Ruth, is one of my final plot readers. She reads 900 words a minute and misses very little.
We talked about the final battle, and she said, “You don’t have enough horses for the men.” This hit me like a gob of mud in the face. As the airship captured Freebooters and their horses, I figured plenty would be on hand.
Search and replace led me through the horse scenes, and alas, the airship had only recovered four horses. Ruth made me name all the rescued men, and I needed seven horses.
This kind of thing makes me crazy. In movies, the trainers and prop department provide whatever is needed, and most Glock-like guns can fire about 3,000 rounds before needing to be reloaded. If seven men are going to mount up, the trainers have seven horses saddled. I’ve never seen a man have to walk in a posse scene.
But Ruth is a counter—and observant. Replays of movie scenes are necessary because she knows if a collar was up, down, or askew. One time, we flipped back and forth because “that door opened the other way.” It turned out that there were two doors in the room, but to be fair, it was very unclear when the character moved to the second door.
So, I am counting horses. My current solution is to send José out and have him bring back three stray horses that ran off during a battle. José has skills, and I feel sure he can rope a horse.
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