Brilliant Ideas From My Lax Brain
So, I was thinking over the last day and a half. This is a monumental event for me because I don’t usually think. Of course I’m being entirely goofy, but regardless, I have an interesting thought. I would like to throw up to anyone and everyone who reads my novel or anything related to my novel in progress, or anything at all about my writing, this nifty thing I’ll title “You Ask / Writer Answer”.So, if the title isn’t giving it away, here is what I thought of. Anyone at all can ask me just about any question about WISB or any other writing. Put it in a comment, throw me an email, and so long as I can answer it I will in a blog post. Obviously I can’t tell you how the novel will end, or what will happen here or there, but I can give you details, talk about characters, inspiration, and most anything else. So, ask away!
Unfinished Business
I started going through all my document folders yesterday in search of a story I had written but never finished years ago that I thought would do well to get my attention for a while. I think it’s a good novella or long short or whatever you want to call it. Well, in that process I stumbled upon all of my other unfinished works, and there are a lot of them. I think endings are extremely difficult for me for some reason; obviously that is the case. Does anyone else have such issues with endings? In any case I decided I’d list some of the stories here with titles and brief descriptions of what I remember them to be about. It’s interesting to see all the different ideas I’ve come up with over the years! It’s also interesting to see what stories I’ve yet to finish. I’m sure some of these will be finished and edited in the future (in particular: Soul For Sale, Artemis, and Europa Strain). Soul For Sale: This is actually a story I’ve finished, thankfully. It’s one of my favorites that I’m working on getting published. Deals with a humanoid robot and his attempt to acquire the ‘soul’ of a doctor. “Soul” is basically a metaphor for someone’s life. It’s sort of a robots way to become more human and for other people to acquire prestige. Artemis: Another that I’ve finished. It takes place in the distant future of Earth after a cataclysmic war forces humanity to make a haven out of space colonies. Artemis is a school colony for kids. Atlas, the main character, struggles to survive as her former friend turns on her and attempts to destroy her through manipulation and the like. It’s a rather good story I think. Europa Strain: This one is not yet finished unfortunately. I wrote it after reading about the missions planned for the moon Europa. This story is set in the relatively near future when research drones discover a super virus in the iced over oceans of Europa and a small crew of men become infected and have to find a cure before the virus infects everyone on Earth. A Tear For Humanity: My first and only SF publication. It was published in a college literary journal and now that I look back I realize how weak it really is. The story is about a boy on his birthday who survives an alien attack in the L.A. area. One bomb, ten million dead. Psychosis: A WW2 story about a man who loses his mind after being left behind in France. This is sort of a psychological horror/paranormal story. It’s impossible to get published because it’s not easy to sell…it’s very dark. They Call Him Benefactor: I don’t remember where this story was going, but I opens in a giant gladiator style arena in the future…and the main character is pitted against big ugly aliens… YA Something: The title of this is just what the document is titled. I never gave it a title, but it is the predecessor to WISB. This story also dealt with going to other worlds, only in this case it involved far too many main characters and too many HP references. I’ll likely do something with it at some point in the future though–lots of editing to come. Revival of the Ancients: My earliest attempt at a novel. It’s far from being finished. I liked some of the story–mostly the plotline dealing with the character Arc and his wife Relena…and the old far Daval the dying wizard–but unfortunately there was far too much going on. This is why WISB has stuck exclusively thus far to one single viewpoint. There will likely be a break away later, but as of now I don’t need it. Down the Spiral: Fantasy at its very cliche-est. It needs editing and some nifty place to send it to really. Where the hell do you send slightly comical, yet unoriginal fantasy? That’s why it’s comical, because it takes elements from everything and makes sure to be cliche…the plot is a dwarf, an elf, a knight, and a wizard who go to find a magical scepter in a serpent’s lair to save their kingdom… Hate: In my Star Wars obsessed days I loved stories involving evil dictator types that could crush you head with a thought…so really that is all that this story is about and it isn’t close to being one percent complete lol. Still, I love the name Lord Achirune… Hello James: I don’t write mainstream fiction very often. In fact, I’m relatively bored by mainstream. I just makes me sleep. This story is finished, just not edited. It’s told through the eyes of a friend who copes with her best friends’ attempts to commit suicide. IDSTOR: Document title. I liked the idea of this one. What if you had to register to breed and had to meet a lot of requirements both mentally and physically? Now imagine you are a midget (or little person) who wants one… New Story: Document title. A space pilot is abducted during an interstellar battle, but can’t remember a thing. He finds himself forced to remember to provide information for mankind to better fight the alien threat. Think Fire in the Sky, only more forward… Skylark: Another novel attempt. I loved the magic system in this. It revolved around hair, so naturally women were better magicians because they naturally grow hair faster. When you used magic, your hair burned away, so magic is sparing. But if you use magic and have no hair to burn, you die. Also had flying ships even though it’s a very fantasy setting. Loved the idea. If Vampires Could Be Depressed: Think about it. What if? They consume all sorts of blood, so what if they were capable of getting depression too? I wrote it as a sort of humorous story of vampires and how the epidemic of depression affects them. Humans deal with it far
…Kinds…
There’s always been a fascination with the way people create fantasy worlds for me. I do it every so often in the form of a map, but for this current project I have yet to take the plunge and draw something. That is on purpose. I don’t want to design a map and then get bored with my world too quick. However, I did come up with something awesome, at least I think so, for this project. Kinds I realize that is just a simple little word in our language. But for me the inspiration came from some music I was listening to. There is a song on the soundtrack for Chronicles of Narnia by Alanis Morissette called Wunderkind. I started to think about that word and thought to myself that using kind as a root word for a variety of creatures would be great. I’m not sure what the english term is for what I’m talking about, but that’s what I came up with. So, I know for certain that Wunderkind will be one of these creatures, but I’ve yet to come up with different kinds. But regardless there will be something like this in my little work of fiction here :). So, that should be interesting to have. Good news is that today is my birthday and it has been the greatest day in the world :).
The World in the Satin Bag
Well I changed the name to the blog because Parvulus Mens Mentis Mundus, while fascinating, doesn’t quite fit into the scheme of what I’m doing here. That and I had a stroke of creative genius at work Wednesday about the name for this YA novel I’ll be writing: The World in the Satin Bag. That’s the name of this novel. Intriguing? Interesting? Does it spark your interest at all? It did for me. Cause right when I was thinking about what I needed to write in the first three chapters, this title came into my head. I think it’s pure genius, but that’s me. How is the writing coming? Well, to put it frankly, very well. I am hoping to finish the very rough first draft of the first chapter this weekend. Then next weekend I will edit and hopefully put it up, but that all depends on a few factors:a) I am satisfied with the edit.b) I haven’t blown my brain trying to edit.c) Something terrible wrong doesn’t happen in my life.and d) I don’t screw something up during editing and make the story all weird.But, if all goes well it will be up next weekend, probably on Sunday. Sunday is also the day I update my webcomic which you can view here! It’s sort of different but I like it. Really I only do it for myself and my friends, but I have a couple of other fans out there someplace. I don’t know where, but I get hits on that page, so obviously someone other than my friends reads my comic :P.Note: My webcomic is in no way an indicator of what my fiction writing is like, so don’t be misconstrued about that. I think the first chapter is only going to be a few pages or so. Right now I have about three printed pages written. A printed page is not a type page on your typical word processor, it’s actually, on average, double the lenght of a typical word processor page. Meaning, you double space something on Word and one double spaced page is roughly the size of a printed page depending entirely on what a publisher prints: font size, page size, etc. But typically your average paperback novel page is the same as a double spaced page in Word.Anyway, so I expect the first chapter will be only six or seven pages simply because it’s the attention grabber and I want to get right to the end of it quick so you’ll be going “holy crap, what happened”. I sort of already have an idea of what is going to happen in the next chapter, but hopefully I can weave that into an interesting chapter, which will likely be just as short. The third chapter is going to be the most interesting of the opening chapters I think though. I love leaving people in suspense 😛
Story Beginnings and Story Ends
What exactly is it about writing beginnings that is so difficult for me? I’ve always found that when trying to write anything that I intend to be longer than a short story, the beginning paragraphs become a barrier that I can’t seem to pass. I wrote three different beginnings for this new story that will eventually become the blog novel this site is meant for, and only on that third try did I get something that started to go the direction I wanted. The first started out way too much like a short story. Yes, a novel should open and grab your attention, but the difference with short stories and novels is that a novel has a little more time to grab you than a short does. The second attempt ended up being way too annoying for me. It started sort of setting up a scene but in such a childish way that I didn’t like it. I think I was thinking way to Harry Potter for it and it just didn’t work. The third, though, clicked I think. It’s not perfect, and I don’t expect it to be on a first draft, but I liked how it opened and displayed in a small short paragraph this very memorable scene. The first paragraph doesn’t have the character yet, but it’s not finished. I have maybe 4 sentences in that first paragraph and right after this scene is set I will introduce the main character. It’s really going to be an exciting story. I got a few ideas from stuff I saw on TV over the weekend on Law and Order and a blurb of Lifetime (which is a terrible channel. Notice that Lifetime is TV for women, yet the women are always being killed, beaten, raped, etc. on there). Now to what I find to be EVEN harder: endings. For short stories it is always a battle for me to find an appropriate ending. I’ve got a few stories that I’ve written that really clicked for me in the ending and I was actually happy with, and then I have a whole bunch that I was disappointed in how I ended them (some of which I reworked and moved over into that happy section). Novels are notoriously difficult for me. I’ve yet to actually finish a novel. I’ve made a few attempts and can easily reach that one hundred page mark, but I’ve yet to get to the end. So endings have me a little apprehensive about the whole thing. I will write this story, and I will finish it, but I am always afraid of what will turn out in the story as it develops and how the story will end. So with my thursday coming up fast, the weekend dwelling in on me, and my writing set on its way I end this post. I am going to write a fun list of stuff in my next post on Thursday about the irritating things that happen when you are trying to write. Should be fun. Adios!
Good News & Bad News
As the post says I have good news and bad news. I’m going to give the bad news first so that hopefully the good news will soften the blow. As some of you may already know, Steve Irwin “The Crocodile Hunter” passed away yesterday. He was killed by a stingray barb to the heart while doing a new documentary. He left behind his American wife Terri and two children. This is tragic news for anyone that is familiar with his work on and off screen. He did so much for Australia and various wildlife conservation efforts across the world. He showed millions that reptiles are not animals that should just be feared, but animals that should be respected and loved just as any other animal. Mr. Irwin will be sorely missed. I already miss you Steve :(. Now for the good news I suppose.Last night I was doing some thinking about what I was going to write about. For those that are new to my writing or the way I work, I don’t think up entire stories and do outlines and such. The problem with outlines, for me anyway, is I have no interest in actually doing the full writing because it’s already been written out, leaving me with no mystery or new things. So, for the most part I think of a single interesting idea to write about and that’s what usually sparks my interest.In other words, I have the beginning of a story. I just need to come up with a few things first before I start writing. But, don’t you worry, there will be some writing on here for sure in the next month or so. I will however keep this thing updated regardless until such time as I have writing to produce. Maybe I’ll put a short story I’ve written up here or something. Who knows.Anywho…