120: The Inner Light
3/7/2023
Well, Chapter 53: The Inner Light came out of me in just the opposite way than the previous one had. It turned out to be much shorter than I thought it would be and only took two days to write. I also wrote the first draft in one sitting, drawing upon no notes from research whatsoever. In fact, I only had two paragraphs of notes prepared in advance but found them completely useless and threw them away before sitting down to write.
This was a dream chapter, so it allowed me to work without a net – not having to worry about the accuracy of particulars. I also wanted to avoid any exposition in this one, so the only things I added to later drafts were dialogue inserts. Primarily for Luala. And if this chapter has a fatal flaw, it will probably be in the heavy-handed pontificating I put into Luala’s mouth. But, as with all my fatal flaws, it’s nothing that can’t be easily fixed in future rewrites.
Oddly enough, my favorite part of this chapter was a short 4-line song I added there at the very end. I just slapped it together at the last second as a song Wanyana used to sing for Diallo when he woke in the night like he did here, and it turned out to be remarkably effective. I just got lucky with it.
All in all, I’m happy for now. Moving on.
Present-Day Reflection
9/22/2026
I borrowed the title, The Inner Light, from one of my favorite Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes. I believe in paying homage to other people’s creative works that inspire me. Nothing comes from nothing. Nothing ever could (paying homage now to The Sound of Music).
I’ve noticed while rereading these journal entries that I make a lot of references to how I might fix whatever ails my writing in future rewrites. Well, those opportunities are almost all gone. I have five more days to make any last-minute edits before submitting my final version of Wings of Providence to IngramSpark and Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing. After that, the print version will be locked-in.
I will be rereading the entire manuscript from beginning to end over my weekend (which for me starts tomorrow, Wednesday and Thursday). Last chance to set things right.
9 days left until my launch date.
