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Post by icon on Oct 3, 2012 20:39:21 GMT -5
After the relative success of last year's NaNo, I contemplated giving it a shot again this year. ...Only problem being, I've not yet ascertained what I intend to do this time around. >> I've got a couple of different ideas for stories flitting around in my head, but at the same time my schedule during November are going to be pretty darn unrelenting and I don't know if I'm going to have the whole time to write 50k words? So I was considering trying to write a film script. Or a comic script. Or maybe I'll just forgo writing almost entirely and finally start planning/drawing the first chapter of that one webcomic I've been thinking about for a while. I'm still on the fence about what I'm planning to do, so put me down as "Undecided" I guess? If I'm not even really writing much is it still Novel Writing Month? I've still got about four weeks to figure it out. We'll see how things go. |
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Post by icon on Oct 7, 2012 23:57:24 GMT -5
So I got an idea for what I may do! =D Not gonna be a whole novel because honestly there's no way I'm going to be able to write fifty thou this year, but I've decided on something for certain and I'll see how it turns out.
I'm going to start putting out one webcomic idea I've had for a while. Working title is Metaghost. 'S about a kid, I think, and she lives in this ordinary town, but of course when you live in an ordinary town things are going to get extraordinary sooner or later, since that's what stories are all about.
...No, that's not quite how to start out. You see, there are these ghost-beings (ghosts? deities? I've yet to settle on the right term) and they sort of... preside over the different genres and mediums of all the different stories, and there are different ones for different genres (As broad as Urban Fantasy or as specific as Satirical Late 90's Romcoms With Animal Sidekicks) but they bicker a lot, they bicker all the time for the most part
And then there's the kid, who lives under the... realm? Domain? She lives under the domain of Slice-Of-Life Comedy, which is all well and nice until something goes horribly horribly wrong as they so often do, and somehow Slice-Of-Life goes missing and it's up to the Kid to do something about it
And of course that's where the story kicks in.
So this November I'm going to see if I can do something with Metaghost. Maybe I'll write out a script for the first few chapters, maybe I'll just write out a script for one or two and then actually draw them out. Maybe I'll just forgo the script in place of a bare-bones outline of plot and hammer out as many chapters as I can.
It's still all up in the air at this point. But hey, that's part of the joy in NaNo
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Post by Zylaa on Oct 10, 2012 14:53:24 GMT -5
You'd better write it, because I want to read it. <3 I can't decide who the best ghost would be... they would all be so fun to write (Late 70s-80s Fantasy for instance)
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Post by Jove on Oct 10, 2012 18:06:25 GMT -5
Metafiction ahh so cool. <3 I really hope you do stuff with this because I wanna read it. I'd love to see the ghost for classic sci-fi, or maybe the one for bad supernatural romance novels... hmm.
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Post by icon on Oct 12, 2012 23:02:46 GMT -5
Ahhh thanks so much you guys! Yeah, I'm really looking forward to picking out the ghosts of different genres to see how I can get them to interact with each other, heh (Bad Supernatural Romance is probably going to be Urban Fantasy's clingy younger sibling) I should probably make a list of all the different genres and themes I want to include in the story so that I can start outlining that. But at the same time, if I don't decide to write a whole 50k words then I might be able to do a bunch of the outline during November. Decisions, decisions.  Haha she was actually the character I had in my last avatar! Forgot to mention that sooner, whoops Anyways this is from before the events that take place in the story, probably. I don't think I'll be able to illustrate a whole story in this way though gosh >> |
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Post by icon on Oct 28, 2012 2:24:56 GMT -5
Wrote up my little synopsis for the NaNo site, so I figure I might as well post it here. Most of the information is stuff that perusers of this thread would already know from the first few posts, but: And I've been trying to write out some blurbs for the characters I've got pegged down so far. May or may not be slightly spoilerlike, click at your own discretion yadda yadda yadda character time now. Crow is the hero of the story. She hails from the small town of Seaside under Slice-of-Life where things are relatively normal for the most part thank you for asking. She is the watcher, ever observant, hesitant to participate. She is the loner, striking out on her own. A pacifist in name and often in nature (though don't assume that she can't fight; she only chooses not to).
Crow makes it out of Seaside after the Incident occurs (still need to figure out what that means) but she's not the only survivor- she's just the only one we see at first. Deacon is the first person Crow meets after the Incident- He’s originally from Medieval Fantasy but somehow he got trapped in Post-Apocalyptic Dystopia and her first impression is that he’s kind of a nut. He used to have magic skills but he’s almost lost them from being stuck in a different genre for too long, and so he’s constantly trying to get his magic back.
(He’s also a bit of a pyromaniac, just sayin’) Slice-of-Life is really really lax about being obvious, which is generally frowned upon by most genre beings unless they can pull it off (Horror, for example, is pretty good at that) but it doesn't really work for Slice-of-Life since nigh-omnipotent ghost-beings are pretty darn conspicuous when you live in a quaint seaside village
But Slice-of-Life really doesn't care either way So these are ideas for the Genre-beings that don't warrant enough of a specific spoiler box, not yet at least
Crow is going to be accompanied for most of the story by Epic Journey, who is basically a parody of Odysseus and Beowulf and all those old guys. He’s pretty senile but Crow sort of grins at him begrudgingly and puts up with him
Noir is going to be a detective ghost in a trenchcoat who delivers hard-boiled sleuth monologues via text narration. He’s totally bffs with Urban Fantasy (who at this rate is basically Crowley from Good Omens but more well-intentioned) and Cyberpunk (who still needs better characterization)
Tragedy, Horror, and Romance are best friends who hang out all the time and do each other’s nails while gossiping about all the other ghosts while they try to avoid Romance’s younger sister Paranormal Romance. Romance thinks Tragedy is a bit of a stick in the mud sometimes and she finds Horror a bit off-putting but they laugh at her jokes so it’s all good.
Sci-Fi is basically the mother figure of half the ghosts: Cyberpunk, Space Western, Post-apocalyptic dystopia, you get the idea. She totally fusses with them all the time to make sure that everyone is okay (they all complain that she’s embarrassing them but they appreciate it) and she’s constantly butting heads with Fantasy, who is basically like a giant tree spirit like something out of Lord of the Rings. Everyone thinks his family is weird and archaic but oddly charming.
And then there’s Surrealism
Basically nobody likes Surrealism More to come if I can think of anything noteworthy. |
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Post by icon on Nov 2, 2012 1:29:16 GMT -5
So! 4000 words into this thing and I've come to the conclusion that it's already turning out much much differently than what I'd planned. >> First part wasn't very comic-y, to be honest- though that might be because I've still got to make these characters actually converge for crying out loud there's only been two who have met so far that I can confirm and Slice-of-Life has only popped up once so far? I have no idea what's going on
But Crow just took on the personification of Eldritch Horror, so it's all good
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Post by icon on Nov 7, 2012 0:06:23 GMT -5
Haven't been posting on this thread. >> Like, at all. Kind of terrible of me, I know. Have a few more biographies in the meantime. Errant is a character who has arrived at the Hub (the TARDIS-y place that gains access to different genres) before Deacon and Crow arrived there, and she's been living there for some unspecified amount of time. She's a bit odd, switching between stoic professionalism and benign cheerfulness at the drop of a hat. Just don't ask her for backstory.
Unit is a robot that nobody really knows about. It's basically what you'd get if you crossed R2-D2 with a Dalek and stuck the thing on a tiny treadmill. May or may not be plotting some sort of suspicious plot against the main characters that only its tiny robot mind knows about.
And an excerpt too! Because why not. The robot slowly makes its way across the surface of the unknown planet. No sunlight, no starlight, only the flickering flash of two small beeping cameras attached to the sides of its head. It’s hard, crossing over craters as large as football fields with near-vertical incline when you’re a six-wheeled robot that’s too likely to collapse from top-heaviness than from lack of battery.
The robot continues to travel along in this lightless place. It’s dark, cold, like bare feet on midnight concrete- beautiful, but impractical when you really get down to it, honestly you could probably freeze out here.
The robot has been out here for seventeen solar cycles now, and even when you have the occasional star in the distance to charge for energy it’s still tough going. The robot would send its data back to the home base, but it can’t (the wreckage of a smashed satellite still remains along the horizon if it looks back far enough).
The robot can’t send information. Its computer is near worthless if it’s not doing anything, though.
So it thinks.
The computer tries to take all the information it can remember, sorting it in chronological order- basic algorithms, its first camera attachment, the mission objectives it received solar cycles ago. It contemplates its goal, the motives behind its goal, the story behind its creation and existence. It contemplates the entire universe, a single speck of binary and metal lost among the cosmos—* * * “Hey! Get out of here,” Philosophy snaps as the two young ghosts stop playing. “I thought I told you to get lost, Space Explorer or whatever your name is,” the ghost yells. “And Existentialism! What have I told you about playing with other genres like that? You shouldn’t associate yourself with the Sci-Fis, they’re a dangerous bunch,” Philosophy says. “They just seem plain wrong on so many levels.” “Aww, come on,” Existentialism whines. “There’s nothing bad about ‘em, they’re nice! I like ‘em,” he says, but to no avail. Fiction is starting to tense up. The genres are starting to turn on each other, the domains of stories are turning. It won’t be long before things boil over.
I'm writing these little snippets of interfictional genre crossover to go in between the actual plot just to make sure things don't get to focused. |
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Post by icon on Nov 15, 2012 22:02:00 GMT -5
Hit 50k today! =D Considering that I still haven't hammered out the rest of the storyline I figure I'm definitely going to keep writing, maybe even see if I can hit seventy-five, hundred thou? Don't know for certain how successful that endeavor will be, but I guess we'll find out. Despite hitting the 50k mark I wouldn't say that the story is a success- at least, not yet. I'm still trying to figure out what the total storyline for Metaghost will be if-when I turn it into a webcomic, and if I haven't gotten that settled then I really can't say that the story is a success, now can I?
I figure that come December this is going to become more of a character study/potential but incomplete plot with revisions and all that. Sort of a study in writing certain scenes, certain character interactions, pinning down the characters and personalities and ideas that I have for the comic but have yet to string together.
Suffice to say I'm certain that I'm definitely not done with this, and I definitely won't be immediately after the story. But I'll figure it out eventually.
I hope, at least. >> “Sorry,” the Janitor says, “but this probably isn’t the best time for it.”
“Come on,” Crow says, “I’ve been meaning to fix the old glider and take a stroll for ages! Give it a shot,” she pleads.
“Sorry, Crow, but I feel like that might be a biiiit too suspicious. I mean, we’re in a pirate story, for goodness sakes.”
It was true; the Invictus had hit the border between genres three days back, and followed the sea into a rather creaky looking old sea town, the docks of which were strewn with pirate ships and other such sundry flotsam.
“Tell you what,” the Janitor says. “You’re one of those action-y, run-and-jumping kids, right? Why don’t you do some of that ‘park fu’ stuff around this place? There’s rooftops, spires, this place is like a monkey’s haven!”
“The term is parkour,” Crow says, “and sure, it is I guess but I don’t have access to the right tools for that.”
“What kind of tools would you even need?” asks the Janitor. “Gloves? Boots? Sorry, Crow, but I’m not letting you take down that hammock. You still need to sleep here at night.”
“Fine,” Crow concedes. “I’ll just do some of that to stay around for a while.”
“Try not to get shot,” the Janitor says. “Some of the city guards have crossbows and believe me those are not something you want to get hit by.” The Janitor looks around. “I’ll see if I can find Errant and maybe talk to a few of these folks, maybe coerce them into joining our forces.”
“See if you can find any Ghosts, too- that could be a feather in our hat.” Crow grins and exits the tavern.
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Post by icon on Nov 25, 2012 22:09:31 GMT -5
I've decided to slow down the writing at 75k and "quit" while I'm ahead. >> I'd love to see if I could aim for eighty, ninety thousand but considering how much work I'm going to have this upcoming week I just don't see that happening. I might try to squeeze in an extra hundred words here or there when I can but for now I'm going to take what I've got and call the story a partial success.
Why only partial? I... still haven't completed everything. >> Like I said earlier I wanted this to be an idea for a webcomic, and I didn't have enough of the plot planned out beforehand to make everything perfect so I'm going to keep working out the plot. This wasn't really a Novel Writing as much as it has been a series of Plot-relevant events that still need to get consolidated/put into chronological order/just arranged in a way that makes cohesive sense, and seeing as it has yet to reach that position I'd say that the month has been a minor failure in that sense, but since, like I said, that was never really my original intention it shouldn't be a big deal.
But I've got a pretty good idea of where I need to go with it, and I figure I'll keep hammering at the story until I feel confident enough to begin it. But it's not quite there.
Not yet, at least.
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