So I’ve been working on Drawing Dead for far too long. Almost two weeks. A strange thing happened when writing it, however. Joesph Varley, the deadbeat bike courier, wouldn’t do what I wanted him to do.

If he’s a deadbeat, would he really be creative enough to bypass a sorcerer’s defenses? If he’s a no-good schmuck, would he really care about one more debt? I can try to make excuses for him, so that he’s trying to pay off his debt because he fears for his life, but honestly, he wouldn’t be clever enough to figure a way past his problem.

Drawing Dead just wasn’t working. So I rewrote the story.

Joesph is not a deadbeat. He’s a schemer. Most of his schemes go terribly wrong. He also thinks (wrongly) that he has the Power of Good Luck. And Varley also has dreams and goals…but wants to take the short cuts to reach his goals.

So when he enters a high stakes card game, he thinks he has Luck sitting on his shoulder. And he does. Bad luck. Now, if you’re a schemer, how would you get out of a gambling debt? More gambling, of course!