Watcha Writin'?

[Zkribbler]

You do recall that some of the greatest SF novels of all time were serialized in successive issues, right?

But they weren't by rookie writers.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

But they weren't by rookie writers.

Who says you can't be one of the success stories? (no pun intended)

Think back to the heyday of the pulp magazines. All the big-name writers of that time were rookies at one time, and some of them hit it lucky right away (think Heinlein, for instance, though he was one of the first SF authors to make the move to actual book format for his novels.

 

[Zkribbler]

Who says you can't be one of the success stories? (no pun intended)

Tor: "Tor.com Novella Submissions are currently closed."
F&SF: :We publish fiction up to 25,000 words in length." [Hmm. I remembered it was 15000]
Clarkesworld: Word Limit: :1000-22000 words, no exceptions"
Writers of the Future: "entries must be works of prose, up to 17,000 words in length."
Asimov: "no...longer than 20,000 words, and we don’t serialize novels."

 

[Zkribbler]

Much of my female lead's backstory takes place at a university. Yesterday, I watched the Marx Bros' Horsefeathers to see if I could steal some ideas from their collegiate movie.. No such luck

I spent two weeks trying to come up with a university comic-adventure. For ideas, I looked at Rodney Dangerfield's "Back to School," "Mean Girls," and some others. Nothing. Then I wandered across Chris Farley's "Tommy Boy," which starts with him at college, as a 7-year
college goof off who spends his time drinking and failing classes. To my knowledge, no one has done this hind of story focused on a co-ed.

Meanwhile, I've been playing around with the beginning of "Not Just Another Fairy Tale Wedding," a rom-com in which the princess accidentally marries the halfling who's come to burgle her wedding presents, "2084," in which I've replaced Orwell's mega-nations with multinational corporations, "Yule," my Viking Christmas comedy, "Eek," a space-faring swashbuckler told by a genetically-altered monkey, and "The Pizza Delivery Guy," a comedy about an industrial spy who disguises himself as a pizza delivery guy but who inadvertently triggers the kidnapping of his victim's daughter. The kidnappers steal the pizza delivery car, and my protagonist must get it back before the police find it and trace it back to him.

I'm really good at starting stories. I'm really bad at finishing them.

 

[Synobun]

2084 piques my interest.

 

[Zkribbler]

2084 piques my interest.

Early on, I ran into a conundrum. Oppression is the central motif of 1984. If I simply mimicked its Thought Police, torture, monitoring screens, etc, reader would wonder why they're reading 2084, when 1984 is a much better book. OTOH, if I abandon oppression, then readers would miss it and grow angry.

Ruminating on this brought me to the revelation that corporate oppression is much more subtle. There is a Barbie-like doll who can carrying on a conversation with you child. The doll does this by having an open mike which transmits your family's conversations back to corporate headquarters. Your Smartphone keeps track of where you are. Your "free" ISP monitors your emails and tracks your internet usage. Thus the omnipresent Big Brother of 1984 is replaced by an invisible Big Brother of 2084

 

[Synobun]

I was working on a personal writing project along the same line. What I came up with was a supercharged version of the Samsung villages in Korea.

Governments lease out territory to corporations to let them handle governance. The corporations pay in corporate chits, you're housed by the corporation, and everything you buy is branded and distributed by the corporation. The more nefarious corps ban fraternization between employees and their friends/loved ones who may not have the same employer. People are split into employees and contractors, the latter of which is a slur for the long-timers.

One technology I came up with in the early days was a myCHIP: "It is a process which involves a citizen receiving a small microchip at the base of their skull between the ear and neck. The microchip itself is called a myCHIP.

The myCHIP does not track individuals. Instead, it functions as a key. Businesses and locales of import are equipped with sophisticated security systems that deny access to individuals without a microchip. Those with a myCHIP who pass the threshold of a building are scanned and their unique code is loaded into the property's database of entries and exits."

Feel free to poach any of that if it's helpful.

 

[Zkribbler]

Governments lease out territory to corporations to let them handle governance.

This is the exact opposite of my 2084, where corporaions rule and governments have atrophied to the point where they're only powerless figureheads.

The corporations pay in corporate chits, you're housed by the corporation, and everything you buy is branded and distributed by the corporation.

I do something similar. Altho nations no longer rule, corporations have spheres of influence, wherein they control transportation, utilities, real estate, etc, Even tho a rival corporation can legally set up a subsidiary anywhere, if a company is located in a rival sphere of influence, the rival can make things tough for the newcomer.

 

[Zkribbler]

After watching this videoon creating a trope RPG 5-man-band, I've started using it as the foundation for How to be a Hero. This video states it's only setting out flexible guideline, easily changeable if one wishes to, say, write a comedy. So in How to be a Hero, I wish to create as much as possible a non-combative band.

My leader is a bard. His sidekick is a ranger whose weapon is a sling but who spends most most of his time morphed into a raven. The "heart" is the leader's new bride. The "big guy" is a dim-witted ogre that the leader met in jail. The "smart guy" is the leader's mom, a mage who's losing her powers with the onset of old age. The plot is inspired from the Magnificent Seven.

,

After watching videos such as this I got the urge to focus on villain creation. This took me to the 12 Labors of Hercules, which has no overarching villain. So I'm now working on
The 12 Labors of Hercule d'Amerique, an updated version set during the American Revolution. I don't remember why I switched from muscleman to intellectual, but I did. Hercule's goal is liberty. The villain is a witch who believes in the divine right of kings. She is creating magical super weapons for the British to use.

 

[Zkribbler]

Before I proceeded too far into the second "scroll" of my Orc Duology, I submitted scroll 1 to my editor to make sure I was on the right track. I wasn't. The first 3 chapters are pretty good but after that. we're going to need massive re-writes everywhere.

So now I'm wallowing through depression, feelings of worthlessness, and am convinced of my total lack of talent. Luckily I am a US male, which means by tomorrow morning I will be back on top, clothed in narcissistic delusions of superiority.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I've been chugging along with my Kingmaker story, a few sentences a day, and will be back to having to count words/day in another week and a half (ie. Camp NaNoWriMo starts on April 1).

There's still lots of my story to tell, so I'll keep working on it (separate thread coming soon).

 

[Zkribbler]

There's still lots of my story to tell, so I'll keep working on it (separate thread coming soon).

I'm looking forward to it.

 

[Zkribbler]

I'm feeling rather smug. Although my wise and wonderful editor set out numerous weaknesses throughout the story, she failed to notice the unifying underlying cause of them. I erroneously believed my heist story is about a heist. It's not. The heist is a subplot. The story needs to be about the character arc of my main character. Once I focus on this, the disjointed parts of my story will begin to fall in line and the flaccid ending will gain some zip.

This isn't to say, my heist doesn't need a more methodical planning stage, Right now, a hodge podge of events results in the heist. We need focus.

 

[Zkribbler]

The story needs to be about the character arc of my main character. Once I focus on this, the disjointed parts of my story will begin to fall in line and the flaccid ending will gain some zip.

My main character wants to be a stand-up jester. This means I'll need to sprinkle stand-up routines throughout my story. Writing stand-up is really hard.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

My main character wants to be a stand-up jester. This means I'll need to sprinkle stand-up routines throughout my story. Writing stand-up is really hard.

Most jesters weren't stand-up comedians. They just did their thing according to what was going on at the time, unless it was during a celebration or ceremony. There's a delightful scene in Philippa Gregory's novel The Queen's Fool where Queen Mary Tudor is sad because her marriage plans aren't working out and her court fool promptly gets down on one knee and proposes to her (in an absurd way that makes it clear that he's not serious but is trying to cheer her up). After his proposal, he warns her that if she decides to spurn his proposal and opts instead for a prince or king and they don't work out, she should remember that "you could have had me!"

 

[Zkribbler]

Most jesters weren't stand-up comedians.

I know. IIRC, stand-up comedy began in the 1930's in Detroit. Eddie Izzard reports there are still no stand-up comedians in France.

But I wanted stand-up comedians in my high fantasy, so I'm inaccurately calling them jesters.

 

[Zkribbler]

Hrumph!

I'm getting awfully tired of wrestling with novels. Around the 2/3 - 3/4 point they just grind down and halt. I am beginning to turn away from them and to look harder at short stories. The big money (if there is any) is in novels, but short stories are more fun. I can turn one out in a few weeks, and I like having written them.

Last night I watched a Xena episode with my god daughters. It's junk, I know, but it's a swashbuckler and it put me in the mood. Then I retired for the evening and reviewed the NaNoWriMo thread. Folks there seem to be having fun. I wanna play too. :envy:
I play NaNoWriMo in a way that drives poor Valka crazy I don't sign up; I don't play by the rules but instead I move in "the same general direction." This time I've done zero prep, and I have no idea how many words I'm aiming to write.

From inception of my idea (at 8 p.m. April 1) to 12 hours later, I've written 450 words. It's high fantasy and a war story (which I never do). I'm using the 5-man-band trope (see 8 posts above). After turning it out, I noticed my situation bears a striking resemblance to England after the Dunkirk evacuation: hordes of orcs across the water and what's left the shattered, outnumbered armies of civilization facing them.
My 5-man-band are commandos who "magic" themselves behind enemy lines. [No, I don't know what their mission will be.]
[Hmm, I wonder if there will be dragons? I like dragons. ]

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

After turning it out, I noticed my situation bears a striking resemblance to England after the Dunkirk evacuation: hordes of orcs across the water and what's left the shattered, outnumbered armies of civilization facing them.

It's funny because circa 1066 the Anglo-Saxons called the Normans orcs.

 

[Zkribbler]

I never kmew that. I wonder if Tolkien did.

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

Justin Hardy certainly thinks so.