NaNoMongering 19: Blog Hop - The Next Big Thing

Introduction:

I almost forgot about this. I know, right, bad Agent Double Oh Zero! Well, it's still November 21st in my time zone, so I guess I haven't technically missed the mark. Anyway, I volunteered for a blog hop. This one is called The Next Big Thing, in which the participants answer questions about their Works In Progress. I was tagged by fellow NaNoer NicoleT.

And now, without further ado, let me introduce you to my baby holy terror of the seven hells Plot Hydra novel series, Dark Arcana.

Ten Interview Questions for The Next Big Thing:

1. What is the working title of your book?

The title of the series is Dark Arcana. The current book, the first, is tentatively titled The Amber of Time. For the rest, I am throwing around possibilities, such as The Octodyne Inheritance, The Clockwork Monk, and The Wells of Acheron.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

It is almost entirely the fault of Doctor Who that this idea exists. In October of 2010, I suddenly decided to do NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month. I immediately knew I wanted to play around with time travel. I started off with certain concepts from Doctor Who which piqued my imagination, and started expanding them. The idea of an agency that sat outside of time, where the members played with timelines, was fascinating. My initial plot bunny started off as a short historical science fiction time travel story with an element of romance. The main characters were an arrogant scientist and a spunky smart-mouthed heroine, and the enemy were a race of alien gargoyle-like beings who went around changing past events for their own ends. It was supposed to be a quick throwaway thing, but over the course of November, it developed into anything but. Now I have an entire hulking Plot Hydra on my hands.

3. What genre does your book fall under?

Science Fiction. Fantasy. Steampunk. Can anyone say genre patchwork quilt?

4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Ethan Brooke (MMC) - No clue. He has green eyes, and dark blond hair. I guess someone who looks like that, but not just anyone. I sort of have his face in mind already.
Aurana Lockhart (FMC) - No clue. She has medium toned skin and curly red hair. An actor who looks like that, I guess.
Oscar Tenebrous - Matt Smith
Jonas von Drachenmire - Tom Hiddleston
Madam Pulovski - Eva Green
Caliiry ren Tandoraen/Ante ark Helain - Milla Jovovich
Pergator - No clue. Maybe voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch, maybe not.

There are a whole bunch of other characters, but the list is too long to include here, and I don't know who would play them anyway. Although...it is kind of sad that I have no idea who would play my main characters.

5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

In a sentence? Impossible. Well, here goes...

Everyone in the universe is after a maguffin called the Amber of Time that will allow them to have complete mastery of history.

Complete crap, I know.

6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

I am thinking of publishing this the traditional way. I want a paper copy, and I want to see this in actual bookstores!

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

Oh, am I supposed to have finished? ...I haven't. Two years and counting. Well...that is, if you include all my first drafts, most of which I have abandoned. The latest first draft... 21 days and counting.

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

To my knowledge, there really is no other series which is exactly like this one. That is, there is nothing I could point to and definitively say 'if you like this, then you WILL like my series.' Mind you, I think this is a good thing! However...

In terms of certain subjects and recurring motifs, Dark Arcana reminds me of the His Dark Materials trilogy, by Phillip Pullman, most especially the last book, The Amber Spyglass. Dark Arcana has a similarly diverse cast of both human and non-human characters, all of whom are battling for dominion, some for survival. His Dark Materials also has multiple universes.

In terms of plot development, Dark Arcana subtly follows the Hero's Journey archetype. Certain characters go through a transformation from human to superhuman (sometimes metaphorically), as they gear up to face the Big Bad. In that respect, it's reminiscent of such stories as Lord of the Rings, and Star Wars.

In terms of conflict, I suppose... A Song of Ice and Fire. The genre is completely different, but like ASOIAF, none of the characters in Dark Arcana really fit into 'good guy' and 'bad guy' categories. Each person has their point of view, and their motive. Each is capable of being a great hero, but also a great villain. That's not to say that they are all equal. Some are more villainous than others, while others could almost be heroes...in different circumstances. Basically...there is no telling who will win. However, in terms of actual content/genre, Dark Arcana actually more steampunk/science fiction than high fantasy.

9. Who or What inspired you to write this book?

Doctor Who. I absolutely love that show. At the time I came up with the idea, I had just finished the 10th Doctor's episodes, and I absolutely loved the vast variety of worlds, ideas, cultures, and philosophical questions that came up. The things that struck me the most in this case were the parallel universe, the fact that the Doctor was the last Time Lord, and the Weeping Angels. In the show, time travel was mostly restricted to just the one universe. The Doctor was a lone god. The Weeping Angels were mere monsters.

I thought: What if, instead of just the one universe, there was a whole mess of universes with different laws linked together into one huge multiverse, and changes actually spawned a new timeline, rather than changing the old one? What if there were a whole group of beings (human or otherwise) with the power to mess with the multiverse like gods, and whose job it was to guard history from...harm? What if there was a race of sentient beings who were biological time travelers, and natural predators of the stream of causality, and thus needed time travel in order to survive?

From there, my imagination exploded, and...Dark Arcana was born.

I suppose, after that, my characters inspired me to continue writing. Dark Arcana, though born almost entirely out of Doctor Who concepts, was never Doctor Who fanfiction. Although I freely admit that I based my MMC, Ethan Brooke, on the 10th Doctor, he soon took on a personality of his own, and pretty much took over the entire series. The same happened with Aurana Lockhart, my FMC.

Now I have to tell their story.

10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

The story is actually multiple genres, depending on whose point of view it is, and what world it is. To Oscar, a peasant child, everything appears as fantasy. To Ethan, who is familiar with science at least up to the 19th century, everything is steampunk. To Caliiry, a Time Agent from the far future who is familiar with advanced tech, everything is explained in almost hard science fiction. To Aurana, a slave with mental blocks installed, magic and tech don't exist. To still others, the use of magic and tech do exist, but are both gross blasphemy against their religion. In this sense, Clarke's law applies: that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

However, it goes beyond that. The story logic allows for different worlds to have different laws of physics...or not physics. In some worlds, magic exists, and science flops, and in others, science dominates, and magic is impossible...and every shade in between. The resulting discrepancies in perception fuel conflict between the characters.

I realize that in all this, I have mentioned precious little about what the series is actually about, so I will attempt that here. There are actually multiple levels of conflict.

The backdrop conflict is between the Time Agents and the Nocharen Sideas. The Time Agents make up a group called the Guardians. They are just regular humans, but they have been pulled out of their own natural history and placed in a facility outside regular time, in order to serve and protect the existence of all sentient species in the multiverse, as well as preserve all the scientific knowledge therein discovered. The Nocharen Sideas are a group of shapeshifting extra-universal aliens, who travel up and down the time streams of the multiverse, and who feed on the energy of temporal paradoxes. Being so at odds in their natures, the Guardians and the Nocharen Sideas are locked in a perpetual time war that has raged through all of known history. The repercussions are felt even within the worlds...

The mid-level conflict takes place in 19th century Terra, where both tech and magic coexist...if not quite peacefully. A few powerful nations have suddenly made striking advances in both. The exception is technophobic Engleter, where the use of both is strictly regulated by the Lord Protector. However, when a power-hungry diplomat from a hostile neighbor tries to overthrow the Lord Protector,
Suddenly, world war looms on the horizon, as nations battle for religious and political supremacy...

Ethan Brooke is a self-titled disciple of chaos and brilliant mad scientist, whose only quest is higher learning, and whose passion is for justice. In the midst of a superstitious society that censures the arts he loves most, and makes them downright illegal, Ethan secretly works on his pet project, a lens to reveal truth. When Ethan uses his invention to acquit a wrongfully accused criminal, the country erupts in chaos. Ethan has always longed to prove that not all those who seek knowledge are necessarily greedy for power. His powers fully exposed to the world, he finds he's unwittingly given the would-be world dominators the perfect weapon with which to quell the dogs of war: himself. Unless he agrees to help develop a superweapon that will protect Engleter's future, Ethan Brooke faces punishment for his unsanctioned practice of the sciences: death.

Aurana Lockhart is a slave of the diplomatic but dictatorial Lord Protector of Engleter II. Provided with wealth and comfort, she is still at the blind mercy of her master's whims. Subconsciously aware of the chains, she still fears to escape, for it means death. Then, a foreign diplomat attempts to overthrow the Lord Protector, and reestablish the forces of tech and magic in Engleter. Seizing her chance in the chaos, Aurana escapes by the skin of her teeth, unknowingly taking with her the AWESOME MAGUFFIN that is the source of all Engleter's blocked magical power. All she wants is to live quietly, but the price of freedom is dear when one's very existence threatens the balance of politics. Thus begins the Hunt...and she is the prey.

Sorry about the crappy vague summary. One day I will nail down just what this book is about, so that I can write an AWESOME synopsis without giving away the whole plot.

Unfortunately, regarding other blogs, I suppose this is a bit of a dead end. I'm not a huge blogger, and most of the ones I know have been linked already. I will update as and when I do come across some others.

Anyway, to those who actually made it through this giant block of text: thank you. To those who didn't...I apologize. I am far better at word vomit than I should be. XD

NaNoMongering 17: The Correlation Conundrum

Dark Arcana. The clock of the world ticks, setting the wheels of the spheres in motion. 

I'm listening to Disturbed.

That means I'm really bored.


This is the phase where I absolutely hate my novel, because it's drivel. Either the scenes are all worldbuilding, or they're all conversation.

Currently, Ethan decided that instead of running around in hallways in the afternoon, he'd rather run around on the rooftops at night trying to both evade and meet aliens. I'm not sure what he's after, honestly. He's taking Aurana along, and while she's with him, she could not be more of a wimpy weepy damsel in distress if she tried.

When she's alone, all she does is walk along an infinite street, looking for something, but never finding it. Well, it's ostensibly a Tor Qveth meeting, but even though she keep panicking about being late, she seems to think it's okay to stop for tea and a bun (with jam), read a newspaper, and get oddly hypnotized by seven dots in an advertisement for no reason whatsoever.

Oh, and then there's Oscar. He needs to cross the bridge in order to get to the gate house or something in order to get an Arcaen knife for a little stunt he plans on pulling soon. Knowing Oscar, he'll go above and beyond what is required of him.

Except I have no idea how to get him past the guards. They won't let anyone through at night, but Oscar can't go during the day because he has to work. His powers are useless.

On top of that, I am having some worldbuilding issues. A couple of my spheres are starting to resemble each other. However, each still has its own unique flavor, and taking away one of them would take away an important element of the story. Maybe I'm just making too much of it. Maybe it's okay to have two tiered cities where it's really hard to travel between different levels, especially when the architecture is so different, they're in different countries, and one stratification is more metaphorical than the other.

What's really driving me up the wall is that I have two princes of two different magical nations who are running around as civilians (Iain as a ranger, and Ozan as a monk) who both want to build an empire. However, both the magic systems and culture are so different that putting one in the place of the other would quite defeat the purpose. Or am I worrying about too much too early? I mean, what's the use of building an empire if there is no one to contest the conquering, right? Maybe the fact that they're both equally right. After all, Ozan and Iain are both princes of nations which are highly developed centers of magic and culture (each of which are vastly different for each). They would both fear that one would subsume the other.

...uh....oh.....oh............dear...................

But still, can I really include two princes in disguise? Or is this just a sign that the situations are only similar on the surface, but that further complexity will surface as I keep going? In that case, it would mean I'm doing something right.

Or drastically wrong.

I'm getting quite tired of it.

I know how you feel, facepalming Loki.

Time to go scrounge up some food.

NanoMongering 15: The See-Saw of Hero-Villain Symmetry

NaNoMongering

Let's get this out of the way first, so that I can finally stop procrastinating on writing. Currently, I am 700 words away from 30k. Hopefully I can at least make that tonight.

I found a song that is oddly applicable to Ethan and Aurana's relationship, inside the Dark Arcana setting. (Memento Mori by Kamelot)

I'm afraid that there is a whole lot of darkness in store for them. :-(

The See-Saw of Hero-Villain Symmetry

This is a thought I had after watching Avengers and the new James Bond movie, Skyfall. Note: Please feel free to call bullshit on me at any time. The idea is that a hero and a villain are two sides of the same coin. Same background. Same characteristics. Same history, with the same traumas. Sometimes they even look the same. Same or highly similar powers. Same fears. They could almost be the same person, but for a single personality trait that is different for each of them, and which drives the choices each makes. 

Loki and Thor. Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort. Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. Frodo and Gollum. James Bond and Silva in Skyfall (this one is certainly arguable, I included it because it was while watching this movie that I thought of the symmetry). Voldemort, raised in a muggle orphanage, and his rabid fear of death and love of power due to insecurity. Harry, raised by muggles, but kind and loving, but also protective of those he loves, also because of insecurity. Yet, though Harry and Voldemort are so far apart in deed, Harry is still aware of how close he is to becoming the evil that is Voldemort, especially in the fifth book. What keeps him safe is the power of love, which sets him apart from Voldemort. Even Voldemort might have been redeemed, had he defeated his fear of death (which Harry defeats), and learned the power of love.

The surface actions are different. The gut fear is the same. This is the heart of the story.

Their fates are so tightly bound that when one gains, the other loses. Same skills, same fears, but two different driving forces, two different world views. There can only be one triumph in each area (physical, emotional, etc.) A hero may win the war, but a villain can gain enlightenment, etc.

That deep mirror symmetry is what makes the conflict memorable. Actions are forgotten. On some level, both characters know and fear what they could become, at any moment. Any villain can go 'MWA HA HA HA!' and blow up a town, and any hero can kick them in the pants. What readers remember is the emotion, the personal stake that both have.

In a moment of truth, the villain gets inside the hero's head, accesses their shared deepest fears, and tempts him to come to the Dark side. The hero does the reverse to the villain. Being cut from the same cloth, they begin to understand each other. They both could turn. They stand on the edge of the knife. It draws the hero straight into the "long dark night of the soul," where all is dark and there's no light at the end of the tunnel. It is the turning point, where one choice determines everything, and that choice hangs on the single strength that sets apart the two characters. We see just how thin the line between good and evil is, because it all depends on the one thread of difference between the hero and the villain.

This is the ultimate conflict, where the hero has to draw on the personality characteristic which he alone possesses, in order to defeat the thing that the dark Lord could not. This is where Lord Voldemort falls to dark magic, because he fears death, but where Harry triumphs, because he does not fear death, and also knows the power of love. Yet, the victory is all the more poignant, because at the moment he triumphs, the hero understands the villain more completely than the villain himself. He wins, then, not out of the hatred which started off the story, but only with the deepest sadness for the twisted thing which he almost became. In killing the villain, he also kills himself, and the darkness within.

At the same time, the villain also faces a choice. Just as the hero can choose to defeat the darkness, the villain has a chance to let go of the weakness which drove him, and embrace the light. Thus, the symmetry. In Harry Potter, Lord Voldemort failed to do this, and dies, unable to face his doom. However, in Star Wars, even as he dies in defeat, Darth Vader does manage a personal triumph of his own, where he acknowledges that Luke was right.

Thus, the most complex stories in the world boil down to this. The heart drives the theme. Love can defeat even death. Change is inevitable, but even a small creature can shape the direction it takes.

Sorry about the word vomit. I have edited this thing so many times that I'm going nuts. I know I have probably left something important out. It's still not the way I see it in my head. It sounded so much deeper there. I have probably cluttered up the point with a bunch of unnecessary worlds. If only I could remember what my point was in a way that doesn't make it confusing.

I need to stop typing now, don't I?

Dark Arcana

Now if only I could find the symmetry in mine. I know I have at least two sets of hero-villain pairs in Dark Arcana. One is Aurana and Caliiry. (I know I said her name was Ante, but it keeps getting stuck as Caliiry, so it's staying that way.) Another is Ethan and Oscar.

As for Caliiry and Aurana, both of them were poor children ripped out of their world, who ran off in pursuit of greater things, and were bitterly disappointed by what they found, both by circumstance, and other people. They both cope by going off in self-destructive cycles. However, while Caliiry copes by aggressively trying to shut out other people and letting her fear force her to make other people fear her, Aurana longs for other people, but her timidity and fear makes her withdraw within herself.

For Ethan and Oscar...different backgrounds.

Actually, now that I think about it, I wouldn't be surprised if the pairings ended up being Aurana/Oscar and Ethan/Caliiry.

Aurana and Oscar are...very similar people.
And Ethan and Caliiry have similar faults.

In a purely random thought experiment, I wonder what would happen if I tried to combine Caliiry/Aurana and Ethan/Oscar.

...Nope. World would explode.

NaNoMongering 10: Brevity Is The Soul of Shit

Nope. Not gonna stop with the crappy puns.

Anyway, another short post, because it's 3AM and I'm too tired for word vomit.

Word Count: 16699
Body Count: 1.5
Chapters: 4

I'm still writing utter drivel, and complete crap, but today's pep talk on the NaNoWriMo site was exactly what I needed to hear. Exactly!

In any case, despite the shitty and clipped writing, things still seem to be happening.

Oscar scares me. Like many empathetic human beings, he wants to help people when they feel bad. Like many children, he doesn't fully understand the implications of his actions, nor does he see it the way others do. Except his methods of helping are...er...

Simile With a Kid:

Woman: "I'm dirt poor and miserable and all alone. My son has gone off to war. I think he's dead. I just want to see him again."

Kid overhearing: *hugs* "It'll be okay! He'll come home! Oh, and I got you a Christmas present!"
*Everyone goes awwwww about how cute and sweet this is*

Now, Oscar:
Woman: "I'm dirt poor and miserable and all alone. My son has gone off to war. I think he's dead. I just want to see him again."
Oscar: *buys her poison so she can commit suicide, and makes a hallucination for her where she meets her son to hide the agony of her dying, knowing that no other gift he could get her would make her happy, knowing that she's a crazy old woman who lives a miserable life which is only going to end in more misery...and wonders why no one else understands that this is what she wanted most. Wonders why no one else did what had to be done. He can't cure her depression, or her kleptomania, or bring her son back from the dead, but he can ease her pain. And did.*
*Everyone shudders in horror, even more so when he says, 'I was just trying to help! How can making people happy be wrong?'*

O_O What. The Hell. Oscar. 

NaNoMongering 8: A Stinking Turd. And This is the PLEASANT Title.

I am finally caught up! Of course, this is according to the NaNo calendar. Since I'm going for 60k in November, I still have more work.

End Day 7. Total word count is 12,001. Body count is 1.5. Number of chapters is three. Behind by 2k.

I am still writing utter crap. There is not one bit that is suitable even as a passable excerpt. The story is not at all grounded in my characters. I circle around them. It takes place in a void, because of the zero worldbuilding I did. People keep forgetting where they are, so there is a LOT of illogical teleportation via plot holes, where people walk off in one direction, and end up in a place that lies in the opposite direction. People meet each other for no better reason than that something needs to happen.

So far, I have kept brains from exploding with copious amounts of handwavium.

Oh, and plot? That's the strange thing. For once, the slightest semblance of one is developing. Author Above, I even have chapters! UNFORESEEN. That's about it, though - a laundry list of events, the implementation of which are actually so wishy-washy that no one even realizes that something has happened until after it's happened. If only there was a prize for unconsciously avoiding every single important event in the story, only to have 12k of characters running through the streets, running through the sewers, running across the Flatlands, stealing bootlegged liquor, and describing their surroundings at the exact WRONG moments...

Oh yeah, and for some reason, my villain has decided to manifest himself as holographic Jabba the Hutt, and seems determined to prolong every scene by popping up at inopportune moments to irritate Oscar with obscure demands that make no sense, and then refusing to clarify what he means, instead launching off into circuitous arguments that beat about the bush. Examples? Repeatedly asking Oscar to deliver a message...when he hasn't given him any, because, if you please, Pergator doesn't trust Oscar. Then he threatens Oscar about what he'll do to him if Oscar doesn't deliver this message (which he still hasn't given Oscar)...except Pergator is a hologram, and can't do shit to Oscar or anyone.

Except be really, really, annoying, and screw with his mind.

Oh yeah, and Pergator calls himself the Empress.

Oscar is a paper character who just goes along with the flow, and has absolutely no reason whatsoever to get involved in the story other than the fact that the villain chooses to talk to him...and even that was a bit of a deus ex machina.

I had to bring Ethan in to be a douche bag just so that someone would say something interesting.

/Facepalm/

Oh well. Looks like I'll have to wait until I edit to make this thing just a little bit less crappy. I am going to hold onto the hope that once I finish the story, and once I write some of the other characters' POVs, that maybe this will start to make more sense.

P.S. Now I know who the spy from Dojong is!
P.P.S. I am slowly getting better at using voice dictation to write. I actually wrote 3k that way today. The words are still not as numerous or as good as with typing, but...I hold on the hope that my hands will be better when it comes time to edit.


Listening To:

Design Your Universe By Epica	Fiction By Dark Tranquillity
Silverthorn By Kamelot	Ragnarok By Tyr

NaNoMongering 3: A Ray of Light in the Chasm of Despair

End Day 2. Currently, I am at 4,030 words.

A small measure of progress. I think I have finally figured out what Dark Arcana means. I found myself using the words "dark" and "arcane" to describe the use of magic and technology, which, currently, all the citizens of Engleter fear. In fact, it's the job of the Lord Protector to guard against it.

I found out that Dark Arcana refers to any knowledge which people fear, and which they would almost prefer not to know. At first, it refers just to magic and technology, but later, to knowledge of the ways of other "alien" cultures, and finally, to the big unanswerable questions in life, the answers to which are in the "dark," so to speak.

I also found out that my opening scene totally fails. I am going according to the "Hunger Games" opener rules I saw in this blog post. I shall paraphrase.

1. Show what your character cares most about, by showing them overcoming an obstacle because they care.
2. Threaten to take away the thing the character cares about, and thus pitch them into the story.

Yeah, I did neither. It's like Oscar is really hard to write about, and I feel like I have to ease myself into his story by circling around him through other characters. The first scene is really about Mrs. Penicott, the mistress of the ramshackle orphanage where Oscar grew up...and whom we will probably never see again! I know that fantasy epics (to which my story is most similar) tend to take their time about these rules, but this is pushing it.

Oh yes, and twelve year old Oscar is pretending to be a necromancer, just because he can, to scare people. Then he goes and stuffs his face with too many peppermints. One minute he's tiny Lord Voldemort, and the next, he's a scared little kid who wants to go to the circus with his taxi fare.

That's all I know. For all my 4k words, I've spent precious little time actually inside Oscar's head. It's all been Mrs. Penicott. It's like every time there is someone else in the room, I just write entire scenes of dialogue from their POV, and avoid having them DO anything, and avoid Oscar's POV. I need to work on having more action in between the dialogue, and showing where the story is taking place, so that not everyone is a talking head in a void. Oh, and I should probably write ABOUT Oscar at some point.

The worst it can do is to give me more words, after all. :-)


Listening To:

Dear Agony by Breaking Benjamin

Theatre Is Evil by Amanda Palmer

No World Order by Gamma Ray

This Type of Thinking (Could Do Us In) by Chevelle

NaNoMongering 1: This Novel Will Self-Destruct In...

Story: Dark Arcana: The Amber of Time

Word Count: 1,122 words. 

Listening To: 

Apocryphon by The Sword

Dethalbum III by Dethklok

Epica by Kamelot

Status: 

This moment in time is best summarized by a whale who made friends with the ground and a bowl of petunias which said, Oh no. Not again!

I have so far written a thousand completely trippy words about Oscar's imminent birth, from the point of view of his teenage mother. Too many spoilers? Ehh, if it makes up for it at all, I still have no idea who Oscar's father is. 

The fact is, I have no idea what I'm doing. I have a million notes scattered all over the place regarding motivations, conflicts, philosophy, and worldbuilding...but still, this is a load of crap. What's a plan worth, after all? What I have is too loose, and meandering. It takes place in a void. Where the hell IS this street? What else is going on in the background? I don't know. For a pantser who's supposed to make all of this stuff up at the last minute, I sure am horrible at it.

I am just trying to remember to write, and not make notes on the side about where it could go. 

If I don't write it now, it will never get written. 

I know I will never go back and actually write notes that I've planned. It doesn't work that way. That way sucks out all the magic, and leaves only drudgery. When I write, I keep starting scenes, and bits of scenes, and then leaving that line of thought when I get stuck. If there's one thing I'm bloody fantastic at, it's writing long, pointless, meandering scenes that never resolve anything.

Well, when rereading, it was really irritating. I wanted to strangle my earlier self. I wanted to see where I was going with it! 

So, this time, my practice will be: 

No notes. Just write. 

It's just me, and the heartbeat of the keyboard.

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Psst. The bowl of petunias is right.

Camp NaNoWriMo, Day 6

I can't believe I forgot to mention this. The title for the first book of Dark Arcana will most likely be Dark Arcana: The Octodyne Inheritance because...that is what the story is about - how Oscar first learns about the power of the strange elemental artifacts called Arcana. Those most skilled at elemental manipulation draw power from the Arcana, and use it to run the Guilds, which are basically a bunch of large corporations/societies, each of which heads a different industry. The Guilds are very prominent on the main planet. However, Erebus (the lair of Khronos) does not have the Guild system, and Hydron (planet of the Water Elementals) doesn't either.

As for the series itself, I do not know how many books there are. It might be a trilogy, or there might be more. I won't know how many until I figure out how much story there is in my story. I must say, though, that the Dark Arcana Quartet sounds better than the Dark Arcana Trilogy.

I made a huge dent in my word debt today. I am still not caught up, and now that the clock has ticked past the midnight line, I have another 1,667 words added. However, I am still only 3k behind, as opposed to 5k.

On a whim, prompted by the dark machinations of my subconscious, based on a suggestion thrown out by a friend, I combined The Fires of Ozan and Dark Arcana. The results were interesting. One was the creation of the water planet Hydron. This was previously just the simple, unnamed world on which TFOO took place. Another is an interesting clash of Asian influences from Avatar: The Last Airbender, the remnants of the now original fiction TFOO, and Western influences from typical traditional fantasy/science fiction archetypes. A third is the aforementioned (in a previous post) clash between Ozan and Oscar.

Any efforts to remove Ozan, both character and story, out of the picture, are met with severe rebellion from the plot bunny. It makes Henry, my Muse, very agitated, and it takes all the greatest arts of The Narrator, to calm her back down. Therefore, it looks like that idea is here to stay...if only because I do not want to put my Narrator, poor guy, through the ordeal of one of Henry's Episodes again. She doesn't deal well with Ruining The Story.

Badges Earned:

Non-stop: Write for an hour without stopping.

Modern: Write at least 1000 words on an electronic device.