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!

Fanfiction - plotting the end

Not the end of fanfiction as a phenomenon, the end of a particular piece of fan fiction. As my two readers may recall, I have two outstanding - as in incomplete, not wonderful - fanfic pieces. One I've been working on with something like regularity, and the other has, until this afternoon, lain dormant for about two years.

No more! At the funniest request I've ever received, I decided to resurrect that story and to finish it once and for all. To my immense surprise I discovered that, despite some issues especially in the early part (wherein I try to be way too clever), I really enjoy this tale. I stopped where I did because I had a chapter to write that didn't fit very much into the larger story arc and because, until I had the action in mind, it seemed like a pretty boring chapter. I had it end with the return of a character who left the story ages ago, a gunfight, the uncovering of a genocidal secret rising to the highest levels of government, and our MC skillfully turning her enemies on each other.

The request went something like this: I'm really glad you're working on the story you're writing for me, [it's a birthday gift for an online friend of mine who loves fanfic more than some people love their spouses] but I feel bad that it's taking your time away from your other unfinished fanfic. We gotta be nice to our readers, right? So maybe you could take some time off my fanfic and update the other one, and I won't feel bad.

Or something. It was strangely sweet.

Anyway, I'm feeling a surge of affection for the story which I hope will be able to last me through the last couple of chapters. I even wrote up a two-page summary and posted it along with the new chapter, for any remaining readers I may have. It was a lot of fun re-reading my story, especially the romantic/sexual tension scenes between the MC and her two loves. So now I must plot the end and get writing it, hopefully before NaNo steals all my time and writing energy!

The fandom is Andromeda, and this fanfic is very AU. The MC is Beka Valentine, and the two male leads are Tyr Anasazi and Charlemagne Bolivar. For the first part of the story, Beka is wreaking criminal havoc and falling in love with Tyr as her loyal bodyguard under the auspices of a crime boss, Darjella Milein. For the second part, she's negotiating an alliance with Charlemagne Bolivar, a powerful leader of his Pride, after Tyr has left to pursue his Nietzschean ambitions. He keeps trying to seduce her, and she wants to marry him off. But Nietzschean family arrangements are odd, and the prospective bride is eager to become Beka's sister; she's under the impression that Beka and Charlemagne are lovers because only a Nietzschean's family would make such an offer on his behalf. Beka's seriously considering fulfilling the other woman's expectations.

Oh yes, and people keep trying to kill Beka for various reasons. She's made a lot of enemies. This story is going to end in a glorious Shakespearean bloody melee, complete with Tyr and possibly Charlemagne delcaring their love for Beka in very extravagant terms. I did already write one line of faux-poetry for Tyr to recite, and I have to say, crafting it was a lot of fun. The line is: “Never have mortals set mortal eyes upon these stygian flames resplendent, aureate damnation.” He doesn't usually talk like that, but he was rendered poetic by circumstances.

Good lord, this post is getting long. I just got a review from ff.net, thanking me in particular for the recap. I wrote it partly for myself, I must say. I would not have remembered half of what was going on if I'd just started writing cold.

Anyway, the plot!
-Having narrowly escaped an yet another assassination attempt, Beka finally going to allow herself to be seduced by Charlemagne, but not before getting a good night's sleep.
-The aftermath of her report on the investigation that nearly got her killed will be widespread chaos and violence on that world, not to mention serious threats of reprisals by the few remaining members of the decimated race.
-I'm not sure if Beka's going to have moral qualms about her job and lifestyle. I think that if she did, Darjella would be willing to employ her in a more diplomatic avenue, which would be fantastic. But that might draw out the ending more than I like. Hmm...
-After a series of meetings which will prove completely surreal for Beka, Charlemagne marries the other woman, and Beka for the first time in a loooong time will have something resembling a family. She will find this highly unsettling.
-Meanwhile, Tyr has started gathering the smaller Prides to him with the bones of Drago Museveni. I'm trying to decide whether he impregnates Freya as he does in the TV series... having little Tamerlane running around would complicate things, especially his willingness to die at the end. One of these Prides the Volsung, which are after all distantly related to his Pride (which is canon!).
-So the whole lot of our heroes are drawn back together again. Tyr needs Charlemagne to bring the Jaguar Pride to his alliance to counter the strength of his mortal enemies, the Drago-Kazov Pride. Awkward times ensue! Beka was once deeply in love with Tyr, and even though her feelings for Charlemagne aren't nearly as strong, she IS sleeping with him and sister to his wife. Soooo huzzah.
-The Jaguar Matriarch, whom we've already met, agrees to discuss the possibility of throwing her support to Charlemagne, against the Jaguar Alpha who hates Charlemagne on principle and opposes the alliance with Tyr precisely because Charlemagne supports it (and probably for various reasons of strategery). Beka goes planetside while Tyr and Charlemagne are negotiating furiously, and the ladies chit chat. Sidebar: conversations between humans and Nietzscheans are just as much fun to write as the ludicrously fancy places I have these characters visit. Nietzscheans cannot resist highly charged conversations, and humans are always intent to prove that they can hold up their end of any discussion.
-The Jaguar Alpha finds out about the meeting and stealthily brings his secretest forces to kill Beka and, if necessary, the Matriarch. It's a bold and probably stupid move, especially considering that Charlemagne finds out about the Alpha finding out and brings Tyr along, ostensibly to stop them from killing the Matriarch and destroying the aliance but obviously in large part to stop them from killing Beka.
-People die. Trance, who's been telling us this whole story, gives us a cryptic epilogue. Everyone proclaims their love for Beka.

Excellent! This is a very exciting prospect, full of loaded conversations and sexual tension and angsty romance. I think I can fit this all into something like three chapters, excluding the epilogue, unless I decide that more sexual tension is needed. It might be.

Brainstorming - NaNo 09

Something I forgot to mention in yesterday's post about Made-Up Religion is the financial shenanigans, which I'm thinking will prompt the investigative journalism that will make up part of the book. And what self-respecting wacky cult doesn't engage in financial (and possibly legal) shenanigans??

My ideas so far, are...
1) "Free" dream interpretation - I also forgot to mention that, because Cthulhu our all-loving savior sleeps under the sea, dreams are very important to this religion - which inevitably leads to harassing people for a longer, paid report or session.
2) Expensive hypnotherapy sessions to tap into the humanity's collective unconscious. During one's intensive hypnotherapy, one is encouraged to cut off contact with non-believers, even loved ones.
3) Expensive training to become an expensive hypnotherapist (unlicensed by the ignorant state boards, of course)
4) Ridiculous claims of trademarks over common phrases and the lines they use in hypnotherapy sessions
5) Ponzi investment schemes. As investors get higher in the ranks, Slytherin claims that they get more in tune with humanity and thus the stock market - and their returns will increase as more people join, especially if they become hypnotherapy trainers.
6) Aggressive litigation against people who criticize them. The journalist undertaking this book is risking a major suit and will probably remind the reader of this many, many times.

I think six financial/legal schemes is sufficient fodder, at least to begin with, in addition to the other things I need to figure out. Very exciting!

A friend linked me to this article, which I'm reading right now. I suspect it will be inspiring.

Brainstorming - NaNo 09

My vast and varied body of readers knows of my plan for NaNo 09, so I'll recap very briefly: made-up religion. Actually, that's exactly how it started in my head after I read a wiki article on one of those cult religions. I've been thinking about it ever since that fateful wiki surf, and I've had some more ideas elaborating the story.

For one thing, it will be written like a non-fiction documentation of the religion, with both narrative passages by the author describing the founders and practices, as well as pamphlets and things written by them. I'm not sure who the narrator will be; actually, this is the first time I've even thought to wonder about that. Hmm.

There are four founders, who my brain insists on associating with the Hogwarts founders. I may change the genders of some of them. Slytherin = the sleazy businessman who engineers the profit-making part of the enterprise. Hufflepuff = the clueless, obscure daughter of minor royalty who finances everything. Ravenclaw = the hardline fanatic who believes passionately in the religion. Gryffindor = the classic insane demagogue personality who attracts all the attention. I think he's the one who made it up in the first place. He's so self-deluded that he may actually believe in it.

The basic tenet of the religion is that Cthulhu loves us all. He wants us to be happy and to enjoy our full potential as his equals, which means accessing our collective magic. He sleeps under the sea and rules it through his disciples, but he's happy to give us the land. His enemies are the cloud-dwelling beings (sometimes mistaken for angels) who want complete dominion over the earth, including the land and the sea. The cloud-dwelling beings have been working all throughout human history to divide us and to pit us against each other so we don't learn to use our communal magic. They've also been working to give Cthulhu a bad name, and as you probably know, they succeeded pretty well on both counts.

So there are some points I need to ponder further, perhaps even outline. These are:
The backgrounds of the Founders, especially Hufflepuff's (supposed) lineage
The history of the cloud-dwelling beings
The history of Cthulhu

However, one of the best part of this project is that the details are completely allowed to be contradictory. The factual parts, the biographies, should be fairly consistent (though differing reports would be fun), but I imagine that some contradictions would not only be realistic for a made-up religion but also present a lot of fodder for pamphleteering and speechifying.

I'm very excited about this. It's an ultimate parody epic in its own right!

Short Story - CannRomCom

For the livejournal writing community of which I'm a member, I wrote this short story in the CannRomCom-verse. Sadly, I finished a day after the challenge ended, but I should be able to post it this weekend. I had no idea what to do with the prompts for the longest time, but suddenly, just a couple days ago, I started writing something--and it turned out to be from the POV of CannRomCom MC. Fun!

My prompts were: abide, pitch, "What part of my subconscious do you hail from?" This is the first entry I've put behind a cut, I think. It's longer than what I usually post here

Brainstorming - CannRomCom

CannRomCom is the nickname I just made up for my cannibal romantic comedy. I'm not sure that's entirely accurate; the cannibal in question may not actually be a human being. I haven't decided.

I was despairing of thinking up a good premise for this story and doubting whether it was even worth trying to brainstorm until last night. A vigorous 30-ish block walk got my brain working, as 30 block walks often do, and I decided that the MC should be a flesh-eating monster, along the lines of an X-Files critter I vaguely remember. That was a very helpful revelation for me; I still don't have a lot of the plot or any of the ending down, but I feel like I might actually be able to write this.

So. X-Files flesh-eating monster. I was debating telling the story from a neutral third-person perspective, first person of the MC, or possibly first person her best friend, who gets bits and pieces of the story at a time. I'm thinking I might go with the third option because I have in mind a funny (well, to my reckoning) opener where the narrator is confiding to MC that she's thinking of going to therapy.

It goes something like... "For what it's worth," she told me, "the decade I spent in therapy taught me two things. One, as a flesh-eating monster, I was just as entitled to my life and my happiness as anybody else. Two, everybody else is entitled to their lives as well." MC stopped going to therapy shortly after she had these two revelations because, as you might suspect, her therapist was trying to get at the root of her delusion that she's a flesh-eating monster. Considering that she really is a flesh-eating monster, clearly their relationship was doomed to stagnate.

MC's thing is that her cannibalism (or whatever it is) is only roused during sexual ecstasy. That's fortunate for most of the people in the world, but, since she had her revelation that she can't eat people without their full, informed consent, it's unfortunate for her sex life. Where it goes from there, I haven't quite decided, but I really like the premise. And I think I like the narrative I'm leaning toward, that of her friend. We'll see what comes of this! If I ever get it on paper (after which I'll immediately hate it), I'll even try to muster up the courage to workshop it.

Brainstorm - UFPE short story

Another idea for short stories I had is from the ten free cities along the coast of the UFPE continent (which so far lacks a name). I could even write a short story for each of them, on the personality of the cities and their wacky inhabitants. I had forgotten the name, so I checked the past entries: Ten Notches of the Glittering Scythe. I do like that, though I am skeptical that all those free-spirited, free city libertines ever agreed to call themselves one thing, fearsome as the name is. Or maybe they didn't agree? Maybe there are just as many names as cities?

I think the thing to do is to base each one very loosely on what I know of existing cities, which in some case is little more than seeing calendars with pictures of them. But it would be easier to keep their personalities straight that way. A full half of those could be based on NYC boroughs, if I wanted to go that way. Well, I don't think I will, but it's a good thing for me to keep in mind, in case I run out of places to base the cities on.

So NYC (could be further divided) and Paris are the obvious ones, since I've been there. San Francisco is another good one and LA because I've at least known people who've spent a lot of time there. Las Vegas would be zany fun to write. Something like Rome would be great and then St. Petersburg, (-berg?) which I know of vaguely because my mother spent a summer there. What else... Beijing was the center of Olympic stuff recently, so I may recall a little bit of that stuff. And of course, crazy crowded neon Tokyo. Excellent!

Now to do something with this. Hmm.