Inspirations

Wow, it's been a long time since I wrote here. It's been a long time since I've written generally, and I'm trying not to blame myself too much. I think most people would agree that the finishing of law school and commencement of bar study is sufficient excuse for a lapse. During this summer of bar study, I cannot bear to write much on my computer beyond my class notes and short things like email, livejournal comments, and instant messages. My headaches have been returning in force, so I've been spending a lot more time reading actual books than staring at screens.

I may have posted before, and I've certainly mentioned to people before, that the people in Oliver Sacks's "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" and their mental states would make fantastic fodder for alien races. I tend to hold in contempt alien races who are clearly just people with some or another exaggerated human trait or clearly based on a certain human civilization. They can be fun, no doubt, but it doesn't strike me as truly alien.

Along that line, I'm reading another Sacks book, "Awakenings," and this line jumped out at as something to file away for when my brain starts functioning again: "The problem of 'side-effects' is not only a physical but a metaphysical problem: a question of how much we can summon one world, without summoning others, and of the strengths and resources which go with different worlds." He's discussing the reactions of patients with Parkisonism to L-Dopa, which doesn't work like the drugs I'm used to: take a little bit for a little effect, take a lot for a stronger effect. It may start out working that way, but it tends to set off a whole chain of reactions, including increased sensitivity (like reverse tolerance).

Anyway, this seems like a wonderful way to think about a system of magic. And I was also wondering if a civilization made up of beings who alternated between states of Parkinsonism and L-Dopa dosing. Fun things to ponder, but now back to bar lecture.

Jemma-Verse III: Flensing

I'm sure my one reader who cannot attend the flensings is dying to know how it went. It went well! Overall people enjoyed the story, the larger universe, the characters, the runic art, and some little turns of phrase and description I threw in. The criticisms were helpful: further develop the Miqo/Kinarre relationship (perhaps with a scene at the bar), make clearer what's causing all hell to break loose, tie the larger story together somehow, bring the characters together to make these short stories mean something larger, re-visit some specific passages, end section with some sort of closure.

I'm thinking right now that I'll have the two agents of Jemma-Verse II be the thread that ties these together; I also like the idea of news articles and things floating through the story, seen by characters in different stories. My biggest problem is figuring out where the larger story goes (and for that matter, where exactly it begins - with Jemma or even earlier?).

Another big challenge will be bringing the characters back to continue their stories; as I've been thinking about it, Jemma and Elorna were killed. But that's actually not necessary to the over-arching plot, so I can mess with that. I was thinking I could either have the agents continue to be the Good Guys fighting the Bad Guys who have abducted (but not [yet] killed!) our heroines OR I could have the agents be unwitting pawns of the Bad Guys, and then they could have their own story, interspersed through the other stories, of finding out what they're doing. In that case, the Good Guys have abducted Jemma and Elorna to keep them safe. Maybe it's because I've been watching Alias lately, but I really like this second idea. The agents should get their own story beyond just the police investigation, after all! I was recently talking with one of my loyal readers about digging further into the agents' characters, and this would be a really fun way to do it.

I'm not wedded to anything, and this semester I'm not sure how much work I'll be able to do. But dang, I can almost see this turning into a Real Novel! It really helps that I can work on this in short bursts with these sections, so it doesn't feel like I have a gigantic stretch of Tens of Thousands of Words staring at me.

Jemma-Verse III: Fun Things

As I mentioned, two ideas from my brainstorming session about Jemma-verse Story III really stuck out to me: magical climate change and postmodern runes. Today during a class where students presented their research ideas, my laptop battery died and I was forced to write my questions for the presenters in my notebook. When I wasn't thinking up questions to ask (because I know I really appreciate people at least pretending to show interest in my presentations), I was doodling some of the postmodern runes that will appear in the MC's pet exhibition.

In the story already is a piece which looks a little like a camera. When someone stands in front of the circle, blobs of color appear on a canvas behind the piece. Magic! These other pieces I'll have to mention because they were a lot of fun to draw and ponder. One looks like a bowl of fruit, which you lick; it's perfectly sanitary! Another looks like an origami crane; it just flies around and maybe makes a noise. Another is a structure of some sort built entirely out of spheres. Another is a carved heart inside a vase; when you touch it, it may or may not zap you. My favorite two are: the reverse Jackson Pollack (it's a painting with squiggles of paint on it, but when you walk past it, the paint flies backward and spatters on you!) and the mouth, which has a lot of scary teeth. When you touch it, it bites you and you bleed - but when you step away, you're all better!

And now I must return to the story itself. I had such fun drawing these, though, that I thought I'd share them with my two loyal readers.

New Story

Because I am a demented human being, I once again volunteered to be the next sacrificial victim for my writers group. This is not demented because they're all insane flensers - they are, but I'm almost used to it by now - but because I have so much else I should be spending my time on, like my two papers and the two presentations that go with them that are due this semester. One of these presentations is due a week from the day of this posting. Oh God.

The story is another tale of what's coming to be known in my head as the Jemma-verse. So far I've produced two short stories, but with this one I think I should admit to myself that I'm really creating a novel here out of these vignettes. I have other ideas for big writing projects, but I don't want to start those out of writers group-induced "oh noes I have a week and a half to write this" panic. And once I got to thinking ideas and scribbling them on the back of a law review article, I had two concepts that I will not be able to put down until I have them fixed in a tangible medium: postmodern runes and magic climate change.

Actually, the runes aren't exactly postmodern because these people don't use that term to describe that sort of art, and the magic climate change is both highly accelerated and very localized compared to actual climate change. The MC of this is a museum director whose story opens with (probably) her dealing with the latest art exhibition of runic art, though it'll be called something different. For some mysterious reason--magic climate change induced by super-secret gov't testing of magical weapons--the pieces are't working right, and of course the artist(s) are being very difficult about it.

I sketched out a very vague plot arc for this which may well change when I sit down to write this. I have a bunch of homework right now, so this will probably wait for the weekend, but I'm suddenly excited about writing again! My evening classes have been terrible about deflating my enthusiasm because my most creativity productive time has been eaten up by class, travel time, and late dinner. But that class ends at the beginning of March, and I think this story will be a great start to shove me back into semi-regular writing.

New Year - Writing Round-Up

I did not post as much as I ideally would have liked in 2009, but it was still more creativity-oriented effort than I've ever engaged in before except perhaps the headiest days of my fanfic-writing days. I did write more non-NaNo original fiction than ever - two connected short stories, some more UFPE, and some RP with an original character of mine I've had in the back of mine for forever now. I've got a much better handle on her now that I've been forced to write her interacting with people and doing things. I may have written other things too, but those are what stand out - again, aside from my two fanfiction pieces, one revived and one started for a friend's birthday.

So overall, I count this blog a success! I'm not going to make a formal resolution on the subject because that's probably the best way to make me procrastinate, but I'm going to try very hard to write more in this blog and more in my Creativity folder in My Documents. My main ideas for this year are: more UFPE and a new story, which is currently called "Alien UN story" in my head.

UFPE: There's so much to do! Perhaps my most important goal is to figure out exactly what tone to take with this burgeoning epic. I have enough genuinely cool things that I want to write it as at least a halfway serious story, but the whole point of the UFPE originally was to indulge in the kind of overwrought prose I do so love writing. That has been a lot of fun! If UFPE were too serious, I might have to spend a few less paragraphs (that is mild exaggeration) describing A's color-changing eyes and Z's long-winded affections. That would be a tragedy.

I want to re-write the first volume. I have to re-write it at least to add a lot more punch to the opening scenes and to improve the pace of the story generally, and I might have to re-think the story extensively because I want a posse for A to travel with, at least for awhile. There's just too much internal monologue, even for a Parody Epic. I should sketch the other characters more fully - I know A and L pretty well, I know Z less than I should, and the others (aside from the Prince I interviewed on this blog) remain foggy figures. In fact, I should sketch more characters period, especially a posse for A. She does have that nymph who appears periodically, but she's too flighty and alien. Hmmm.

I also want to write some short stories set in the Ten Free Cities. I had a wonderful time naming and describing the Ten Free Cities in a notebook, along with the central character in each city that the short stories will revolve around. Each is based extremely loosely on an existing city. I have to say, my excitement for writing fantasy has jumped with my reading of the latest "Wheel of Time" volume, which encompasses both the excellent and the meh in fantasy.

Alien UN: this story was first inspired by my viewing of the first season of "Babylon 5." I want to create something like a United Nations of aliens, except it's completely useless. Okay, more useless than its critics today say. They're purely a figurehead so the powerful races can wreak havoc and the weak races can feel like they aren't total chumps. Except one day, for reasons I've not yet fully comprehended, they suddenly are forced to become relevant. Do I know where this is going? Not really. But I love the idea, and I really want to try my hand at some original science fiction. I also have a character, the RP character I mentioned earlier, who's been in my head for years but unable to find her own story. She would not be one of the diplomats; I think she would be first mate on a spaceship run by a shady bounty hunter. I think there's going to be a huge disaster, natural or otherwise, that wipes out a LOT of the races' leadership, and the Alien UN are so desperate for info/communication/travel/whatever that they basically commandeer this bounty ship. Wacky antics ensue! I don't even know where the focus of the story will be; it could even be several interconnected tales.

So those are my goals! I'm not sure which is my priority, but I should poke myself to post something here once a week or so and to write... well... more often than I do now.

Excerpt - NaNo 09

I may fail to post anything creative during NaNo, but that doesn't mean by two faithful readers should be completely deprived. Well, one of them is actually not deprived at all because I email him excerpts. Well, here's an entire Chapter of the Book of Venire for your perusing pleasure. Now let's see how screwy Blogger can possibly make the html here...

Oh, and I have removed the footnotes. They're fun, but this part is long enough without them.

Excerpt: The Book of Venire, Chapter in which believer Kinshos receives a True Dream but denies His True Word

Author: Unknown
Publisher: AuthorHouse

The Power That Dreams did touch the mind of a believer, Kinshos, and Kinshos did dream. The dreams of Kinshos foretold a new world, and in that world, Kinshos told all peoples about The Power That Dreams. Far did he travel and far did he preach the Word of the Supreme Lover of Souls. Though he did the work of the Higher Power, yet was he spat upon and kicked and thrown to the dust. Though he preached the Words of Love, yet was he battered by the people tainted by the whispers of the mongers of hate, the winged ones. Kinshos awoke with tears streaming from his eyes, for he had witnessed in his True Dream his own death. The Power That Dreams had shown him that the claws of the winged ones would tear Kinshos in twain, and again in twain, until naught remained of Kinshos but blood on sand.

Kinshos told no one of his True Dream, not his brothers and sisters in the True Faith, not his wife and children. The Power That Dreams saw all this as He slept 'neath the sea, and He did tremble with a most holy wrath. Kinshos forsook his brothers and sisters in the True Faith, his wife and children, and fled for a distant port on waters sapphire and still. But when Kinshos placed his unworthy foot on the ship that was to carry him far from his home and community, lo! The seas foamed as if beaten and the waters ran red as blood. The heavens darkened. Great storms whipped the seas into a screaming frenzy and harried the ship until it was many leagues off course. Monstrous creatures never glimpsed by human eyes rose from the seas, gnashing their many teeth and moaning their hunger.

“Surely a god has set his wrath upon this ship!” the sailors cried, but Kinshos remained silent. These sailors were masters of their seafaring craft, yet their every trick only cast the ship further and further from familiar stars and familiar waters.

“Surely a god is demanding vengeance!” the sailors wept, but Kinshos remained silent. He knew that his disobedience to the True Dream had sent this storm, yet the same fear that had driven him from his home and the course he had dreamed now drove him to silence.

The surface of the waters broke as a mountain appeared to rise from the sea. Luminous it was, shining though there were no stars to light its skin. The sailors fell upon their deck and hid their eyes, for they knew without understanding the reason that one glance upon this Great and Mighty Creature would drive them utterly from their senses. Only Kinshos dared to look, for he knew that he gazed upon the Power That Dreams. Still the Supreme Lover of Souls dreamed, but in His True Dream, he lashed out with one mighty tentacle to destroy the one who had defied the True Dream He had sent.

It was not a mountain that parted the foam, but a tentacle, as long as the horizon. Kinshos wept to see The Power That Dreams, no longer for fear but for the love he felt. The Power That Dreams sends True Dreams to those He Loves most dearly, and this man's treachery had cut him to His Loving Soul. For even in anger, the Power That Dreams Loves humanity with a Love that is beyond our reckoning. Kinshos leapt to the bow and spread his arms wide.

“Supreme Lover of Souls!” he wept. “I have failed the True Dream. Though I have woken Your Wrath, I do not deserve this glance upon Your Shining Flesh! Only spare these sailors, and I shall preach Your Word this very day. I shall preach it until the day I perish, whether that be this day 'neath Your Sea or a century from now in a far land.”

The Power That Dreams then Dreamt that He touched Kinshos as gently as a mother kissing her newborn babe. The waters stilled, the thunderheads departed, and the sailors stood again, amazed at what they had witnesses.

“'twas you!” they cried. “Kinshos, you brought this storm upon us!” He confessed that he had provoked the Power That Dreams, and they spat at him. They kicked him and battered him, but as the blows landed on his flesh, Kinshos proclaimed the True Word of the Power That Dreams. When the sailors tired, they found that their ship had drifted back to its course. They tied the moorings of their ship and brought Kinshos to the front of the bow.

“Kinshos! You have caused the wrath of the seas to rise against us, yet you also calmed them. Even as we punished you, you preached the True Word of the Power That Dreams. We must cast you now from our ship, but we must also confess that we are eternally indebted to you. For your faith, we have realized the error of our false faiths and have accepted the Supreme Lover of Souls into our hearts. Go now and do not curse our ship again, but spread the True Word that the Power That Dreams has tasked you to spread.”

Kinshos wept many tears. The sailors cast him from the ship, and he fell on sharp rocks as he tumbled to the sands of the shore. At that moment did he understand the True Dream the Supreme Lover of Souls had sent him. In truth, he had been spat upon, kicked, cursed, and battered. In truth, he now lay upon sands of a distant land as his blood spilled from him. In truth, he died, but it was his fear that died, his hardness of heart. All these were the claws of the winged ones he had seen in his dreams. After a day and a night on the sand, Kinshos arose again and began to preach the True Word of the Power That Dreams. He showed many of his brothers and sisters the Way of Love and Unity, and together they rejected hate and fear.

The world that Kinshos witnessed in his True Dream did not come to pass within his lifetime, for his brothers and sisters in faith were sworn to secrecy. Thus he had been taught, and thus would the True Faith thrive for thousands of years. Yet Kinshos did expand the community of True Faith, and many more reached out to trusted brothers and sisters. Thus for the first time did the community reach across the globe, like the great tentacles of the Power That Dreams.

Plotting - NaNo 09

Only 8k words in, and I began despairing of making word count. This isn't because I don't have sufficiently rich fodder for my fictional non-fiction account of a made-up cult but because I have a hard time organizing it and keeping the passages different from one another and interesting to write. I can only say "Cthulhu loves us" in so many ways, so many times.

But then I had a revelation: if I ever am desperate for words, I can re-write various Bible stories according to my modified Cthulhu mythos. The most fun of these will of course be Cthulhu Genesis and Cthulhu Revelation (in which we actually are eaten, but in being eaten, we are transported to a dimension of pure love and union and wisdom), but the more I think about it, the more I think that any Bible story can be re-written as a Cthulhu story. One of the founders claims to be the illegitimate son of African dictator Jean-Bedel Bokassa. I forgot which country he dictated, but the important thing is that he claimed to be the 13th Apostle secretly anointed by the Pope. Admirably crazy. This is a great way for this character to claim that he is a prophet and so has visions of the way various Biblical stories REALLY went.

Jonah and the whale? Jonah and the tentacle monster (who just ate him because he wanted to enlighten him). Dude on the road to Damascus? Dude on a sea voyage where he meets Cthulhu. Tower of Babel? Big tower that gets destroyed by the evil winged creatures because people were working together too much. I think there's definitely 50K worth of material there if I can't think of anything else. But I draw the line at the begats. Oh, and I also have arbitrary rules to make up. Woohoo!