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Post by Avery on Oct 24, 2007 1:23:31 GMT -5
I'm having a really hard time thinking of a title. T_T I like having them early so I can put it in my Nano site signature. x3 The only thing I have right now is 'The Imaginary Invisible' or 'The Invisible Imaginary' but those make no sense.  |
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Post by Avery on Oct 24, 2007 16:34:48 GMT -5
Blah, so now I have another plot idea nagging at my mind. T_T And I dunno what to write: the one I posted a couple posts back, or this one.
The new one is kind of similar (dealing with death/afterlives), but... not. Basically:
A 14- or 15-year-old girl steals her mom's car, crashes, and dies. She arrives at an afterlife type of place - it's very dull and business-like. Someone at a desk calls her name and says this place is just like a pit stop to the afterworld, and depending on her beliefs during her lifetime, she can either go to heaven, be reborn, exist in limbo, etc. MC really had no religion during her real life; she didn't know what happened after death. Didn't believe in heaven, hell, rebirth, limbo... anything. But she's told now to pick something, and she decides to pick rebirth. Unfortunately, there's certain 'quotas' - like, she can't be human again (having already been one), and for the more popular choices, there's limits. There can only be a ____ number of tigers or lions or elephants out there, and there's long waiting lists to become those, and those waiting lists are closed off. So she can basically only become like, a squid or spider or something menial like that. She gets in a squabble with the dude telling her this and eventually manages to finagle a deal with these 'pit stop' people: they're looking for teenagers to help other teenagers cope with their deaths (to become basically teenage 'pit stop' people), and they're currently in the process of 'training' these teenagers. Normally, they're preselected before their deaths and given this option, but MC proves to be kind of unruly and on the brink of qualified, so they offer her this. She doesn't want to do it, but gobbles up the opportunity because she also doesn't want to become a squid.
So, it's about her and these other people at this limbo pit-stop place, and how they cope with their odd, twisted job. Some plot twists potentially thrown in, with maybe MC staging an uprising or something, and trying to escape back to Earth after figuring out that she's not officially 'dead' in this limbo world.
It's very complicated, and I didn't explain it justly, but... I just dunno whether to do that or my other idea.
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Post by Sq on Oct 24, 2007 18:03:11 GMT -5
Hmm... that one is kind of confusing, so I don't know which one I like more. XD I do still really like the imaginary friend one, though. <3
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Post by Avery on Oct 26, 2007 21:10:20 GMT -5
Picked my idea! Going wit the last one I've posted. It's kind of morphed, majorly, and now it's mostly going to be about my MC (Arielle, or Elli for short) escaping back into Earth and throwing the entire concept of life and death into whack.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2007 13:26:44 GMT -5
D: I liked the imaginary friend one. But this one sounds interesting...I think--considering you just revamped it. xD So I'll have to probably wait to hear more about it.  Haha, but it's you're story. XD I'm just here for the viewing! LOL THAT WAS LAME |
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Post by Avery on Oct 28, 2007 14:31:24 GMT -5
D: I liked the imaginary friend one. But this one sounds interesting...I think--considering you just revamped it. xD So I'll have to probably wait to hear more about it. Haha, but it's you're story. XD I'm just here for the viewing! LOL THAT WAS LAME The problem with the imaginary friend one was that it didn't have a great deal of substance. I could easily have seen myself running out after 10,000 words, whereas the other one is more complex and has enough material for 50k. |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2007 14:46:03 GMT -5
D: I liked the imaginary friend one. But this one sounds interesting...I think--considering you just revamped it. xD So I'll have to probably wait to hear more about it. Haha, but it's you're story. XD I'm just here for the viewing! LOL THAT WAS LAME The problem with the imaginary friend one was that it didn't have a great deal of substance. I could easily have seen myself running out after 10,000 words, whereas the other one is more complex and has enough material for 50k. Ah, clever! |
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Post by Avery on Oct 29, 2007 2:20:28 GMT -5
I know everyone is probably sick about my Nano blabberings, but... eh! My idea has molded. xD It's now going mostly to revolve around my MC (Elli) and two friends she makes at this place (okay, they're originally her roommates, but they become friends) escaping back to Earth. x3 They expose this gap between life and death and send the world kind of into whack by opening up this leak. The guy running this pit stop place chases after them onto Earth, and the story will kind of be the characters trying to evade being taken back there, and it will also show how stuff starts falling apart on Earth and in the pit stop due to this whole bridge between life and death being opened. Also, Elli and her friends are now immortal, so that adds a whole different aspect into it (and they can't be injured really-- no broken bones, etc.). I'm really excited for Nano; I've never really written anything like this, and it's probably a bit cliche, but... eh xD. Okay, here's a 'back of the book teaser' I wrote up for a thread on the Nano sites. It's awful, but bear with me. xD Elli Kaczynski didn't plan on changing the world. Then again, she didn't plan on dying at fifteen, either.
After borrowing her mother's car and crashing it headfirst into a highway divider, Elli's life is over. Following her death, she finds herself in a drab, sterile room, staffed by rather ordinary looking people. Elli is told that this is the Corporation, a tiny dimension between Earth and the afterworld that's been around since the dawn of time. While it's just a pit stop for most people on the way to their afterlife, Elli's been preselected to become a new helper. Unfortunately, that's just a sugar-coated job title for those who inform the newly deceased of their passing and guide them to heaven or hell.
Elli soon begins to resist her forced position and accidentally discovers a fact that could forever warp the Corporation and life and death as a whole: she's not really dead, and neither is anyone else while at the pit stop. While their bodies are gone and buried on Earth, the Corporation is still so closely linked with the world that it's possible to get back there and begin living again.
Elli acts quickly on this forbidden information and escapes back to Earth, accompanied by two friends she's made during her forced, miserable time at the Corporation. As a virtual clone of her old self, Elli is hellbent on exposing the gap between life and death, and she quickly plunges both Earth and the Corporation into total chaos. Immortal and immune to injury and sickness, the ill affects around Elli and her companions hardly distress them-- but they do have one urgent problem.
His name is Nathan, he's a high-ranking board member of the Corporation, and he's been sent to Earth with one goal: to retrieve Elli and her friends, no matter the cost. And my characters and additional plot points! Name: Arielle “Elli” Kaczynski
Age: 15
Appearance: Light blonde hair, green eyes, tall
Elli is the main character. She dies in a car crash and is taken in to staff the pit stop place after being unusually difficult about her afterlife path. She immediately starts resisting and eventually figures out everyone there is not exactly dead, and she and her friends reenter Earth as 'doubles' of themselves. Meaning, their old bodies are still dead, and they're kind of... clones of themselves. She goes sorta fanatical about exposing this pit stop place, pulling off stunts to prove her immortality while trying to avoid recapture by the pit stop (I'm trying to think up a corporation name for them to make it seem more... business-like x3). The government also scrambles after Elli and her friends because of the stunts, so she might have to be taken in by some eccentric dude mid-plot to keep her hidden. xD
Name: Delilah Carey
Age: 14
Appearance: Blonde hair, hazel eyes, short
Delilah was a very bright, promising girl during her life, and I'm thinking she was murdered in a highly publicized case or something like that (adding another element to the plot, as her death probably received news coverage). All she wants is to go back to her family, and back to her life, but she soon figures out this isn't feasible-- both because of Elli's obsession with exposing the pit stop, and because returning to her mom and dad would confuse and shatter whatever fragile life they'd continued living after her death. Delilah will probably be the most complex character, and she'll have extreme moral problems with the stunts Elli is pulling to show the world what happens after death. She might also rescue Elli from dangerous situations and be the kind of... stable... person in their group.
Name: Imogene “Genie” MacLeod
Age: 16
Appearance: Strawberry blonde hair, blue eyes, tall, thin
I'm not really sure where the name came from-- it just sounded right, even though I never, ever have named a character anything remotely like this. xD Anyway, Genie is a very nervous, stubborn girl. She can be irrationally fearful, and she's always second-guessing Elli. However, ultimately, she goes along with whatever Elli says, because she's too scared to think of ideas on her own. I'm thinking Genie might eventually become a mole and report to the pit stop people (okay, I really need a better name xD), especially to the guy in charge. She's easily won over and hates going against authority-- she's kind of a pushover. However, she's still really stubborn when she does get an idea. Elli probably won't listen to her, which may be what leads Genie to double-cross her.
Name: Nathan Eiford
Age: Not sure-- probably middle-aged
Appearance: Black hair, brown eyes, clean-cut, tall, buff-- looks very likable and charming
Nathan is very high ranked within the pit stop-- he's the one who goes after Elli, Delilah, and Genie. He's very suave and persuasive, and while he can come off as charming/flirtatious to stranger, he has a very mean, cold side. He's willing to do anything to get Elli and company back into his 'custody', and he's also immortal, so he has no fear of death/injury. He's a very typical bad guy character, and while his motivation may seem very one-dimensional at first, over time, he'll develop into a fairly complex character with some deep moral dilemmas. Dead or not, he is - or was, at least - human.
Also, I've figured out that occasionally, this pit stop 'culls' death bringers and sends them off to a preselected afterlife. It's to keep up with modern times, so the newly deceased can sort of relate to the people they're talking to. However, there's a high council - or board - of people who run the place and stay there forever (or until they desire to move on to what they wanted for their afterlife, anyway). I'm thinking Nathan is the most recent member of this board, and he's from maybe 20-30 years ago (they don't age after death, so he looks the same). That's why he's sent after Elli, Delilah, and Genie; because he can infiltrate modern day society and fit in best with its quirks.
Yeah. Really long post, sorry. I'm just plotting out loud. xD |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 29, 2007 20:20:50 GMT -5
This sounds so cool. Be sure to post regular excerpts! |
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Post by Belle on Oct 30, 2007 0:11:27 GMT -5
This sounds very interesting.  I'll be waiting for the excerpts, as well.  |
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Post by Avery on Oct 30, 2007 2:32:51 GMT -5
Thanks guys! ^_^ I'm actually excited for Nano. I thought up my opening line today. x3 Now all I need is a title that isn't total crap. xD
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Post by Avery on Nov 1, 2007 2:52:56 GMT -5
First couple hundred uber-crappy words of my Nano. xD;; Unedited, utterly horrible, so fear! =D When Elli died, she found herself not in heaven or hell, but at the Corporation. One moment, she was tangled in the wreckage of the stolen car, desperately trying to push out of it, and the next, she was standing in a sterile room, fluorescent lights flickering down on her balmy skin, the eyes of a rather ordinary looking man staring her over. Off the bat, Elli knew was dead; there was no question about it. People didn’t survive ninety mile per hour crashes into concrete highway dividers, after all. So her status in life or death was not a mystery. Her location, however, was.
“Arielle?” said the man before her, straightening his peach-colored tie.
Elli cringed at the use of her full name - no one had called her Arielle since she was five or six. Nonetheless, she swallowed her pride and said to the man, “W-what?”
“I’m Nathan.” The man, Nathan, leaned forward at his plain wooden desk. “Do you know where you are, Arielle?”
Elli shook her head, struggling to hold back tears. “Am I supposed to, Nathan?”
“No.” Nathan forced a smile. “I’m supposed to tell you.”
“Oh... okay.” Elli hated how Nathan was beating around the bush with her. She’d never much liked adults during her short life on Earth, especially ones who snaked their way around the facts. Nathan was already pushing the fifteen-year-old’s buttons, and add into the equation the fact that she’d just died, Elli was about ready to snap. She added curtly, “Where am I, Nathan?”
Nathan said, “I’m sorry to say, Arielle, that you’ve passed away.”
“Yeah. I figured that. But that doesn’t tell me where I am.”
Nathan crossed his arms. “You’re taking it rather well, Arielle.”
Elli shrugged, feeling numb inside. She knew the veracity of her situation would set in soon - and hard - but for now, she was immune to feelings. Maybe she was dreaming. Maybe this was all fake. Because she couldn’t be dead; she was only fifteen. And even if she was dead, she wouldn’t have ended up in an odd, office-like place with soft tile floors and peeling grey wallpaper. No, she would have been transported to heaven or hell, or maybe even purgatory or rebirth. Anything but this.
“Arielle?” Nathan said, snapping the girl away from her frantic thoughts and back to reality.
“W-what?” she stammered with a sickening shudder.
“Are you okay?”
Elli shook her head, then nodded. “Yeah... I just... I’m... kind of taking it all in.” She closed her eyes as hot tears burned against her lids; she couldn’t let them go. She couldn’t cry.
“Would you like to know where you are, Arielle?” Nathan asked.
“Yes, please,” Elli whispered.
“You’re at the Corporation.”
“What?” Elli’s eyes snapped open at this.
“We’re a pit stop on the way to the afterlife,” Nathan explained. Elli was about to burst from depression, anger, and utter confusion, but Nathan kept his cool. It was if he was oblivious to Elli’s palate of emotions. Either that, or he just didn’t care.
“Pit stop?” Elli spluttered. “What’s that mean?”
“Normally, we help the newly deceased come to terms with their deaths, then lead them to the afterlife. Depending on their religious beliefs and convictions when they were alive, that can either be heaven, hell, reincarnation, or something else.” Nathan still maintained a formal, business-like tone.
This bothered Elli, but she didn’t say so. Rather, she slowly asked, “So... like... if I believed in my lifetime that I was going to go to heaven, I’d go to heaven? But if I thought I would be reborn, I’d be reborn?”
“Normally, yes.”
“Normally?” Elli inquired. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Nathan chewed on his lip - evidently a nervous habit. He stared deeply into Elli’s eyes for a moment or two, then broke the stare and looked down at his desk instead. Losing for the first time the sense of collected seriousness in his voice, he said, “For most people, that’s what happens here at the Corporation. One of my... colleagues... will talk to them, help them come to terms with their passing, then they go on their way to the afterlife. But with you Arielle, well - you’ve been selected.”
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Post by Tashni on Nov 1, 2007 2:55:44 GMT -5
Can I say what an AWESOME first sentence that is? It usually takes me until the third or fourth draft to get a good first sentence out. Really engaging beginning, Carrie!
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Post by Avery on Nov 1, 2007 2:57:02 GMT -5
Can I say what an AWESOME first sentence that is? It usually takes me until the third or fourth draft to get a good first sentence out. Really engaging beginning, Carrie! Thanks Tash. xD;; It's not turning out great, but that's what Nano is for, and I hope it'll pick up in the middle! ^^ |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 1, 2007 21:46:44 GMT -5
Oooh, I like it.  This oughta be good. |
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I'll be waiting for the excerpts, as well. 
This oughta be good.