Air plan

Alright. So as I ponder the nature of the elves, it actually makes a lot of sense for them to have the froo froo gothicy frilly stuff they often have in fantasy tropes. Not because 5 year little girls like that kind of thing, but because when I ponder the Sopensen reaction to humans, it will eventually end up with the humans under their care after the Fulcrum event; as pets.

Sopensen are the Greeks/Native Americans of the setting in the sense that they have an extremely advanced and noble culture that gets stomped/stolen/borrowed/overshadowed by the humans. They were the ones that saved the world and made it livable after the Bleyoki. Of course, it also doesn't change the fact that they kind of did the same thing to the other four races that came before, but one could argue that in their case, unlike that of humans, they actually deserve some credit for two to three thousand years of impossible struggle to save the world as compared to gaining dominance simply because of a clever trick Pickle played on Fa and Sa.

Thus, they are going to love humans, but secretly hate them. The manifestation of this is an increase in life span, power, intelligence and beauty; all of the things that Elves typically have, but they are a culture of pets. And I think at the time of this story there is just one Sopensen that has not moved on to 'other things.'

The problem is, how do the pets react to normal humans? On the one hand, it will be the typical reaction of arrogance and disdain. After all, elves, like always, are better and more human than humans in virtually every way, and they live five to seven times longer. On the other hand, they, much like the Sopensen, will secretly hate and resent humans for their freedom for domination; even long after most of the Sopensen have left, their own culture and nature will continue to imprison themselves. A society doesn't stagnate on its own unless it turns inward, which means that is the way the elves will have to behave. However, I picture the elves having 'missions' to the 'lesser' human peoples, much like occurs now...

And the manifestation I see of this are Elven gifts. Magical abilities which are given to selected humans. Thus, our story will be about a human who is selected by a bunch of elves, taken back to the Elven city, made an Elven pet and given the gift. I'm thinking the gift goes wrong, the Sopensen steps in, chides the elves, and in so doing shows how the Elves themselves are 'pets' much the way they have treated the human visitor, and then the human goes back to the human lands with the gift in tow, much the wiser for her experience.

I'll have to take a day to think about our character and her gift.

Changes and Root Canals

So I realized that I'm the author of my own story.

Yeah, sounds trite and stupid, but the point is that if I'm not satisfied with a story, I should change it. It is true, that a balance must be struck between piddling around with the same story over and over again and putting stuff out. Well I've put lots of stuff out and its time, in my opinion, to notch up the piddling around with it until I get it to work.

I'll finish Earth and Water, but quite frankly, starting with Air, I don't do any more stories until I get it set up right, which I intend to do this week. I've also learned that when I compare novel 3 to novel 2 I do understand that it should all be written at once and quickly. I'm thinking that with air I write it all in three days. Which means I use the process I use with scripts, including putting down the entire plot ahead of time and THEN filling in the blanks. My stories come out much stronger that way.

My mother in law had as much difficulties with the 2nd novel as my mother did. Specifically the beginning. I'm going to perform a root canal on it, and radically change a few things whilst trying to save the core story. We'll see if it helps. If the foundation is not strong enough, I'll just have to move on, like I did with the first novel.

Which makes sense, since I usually have to do twice as much as anyone else to learn something, so if a natural writer doesn't really get to the good stuff until after their first novel, why not expect me to require at least two?

The plot?

So...a creative exercize...how do I get a human into the elf lands? The truth is, that unless they're a merchant or a sailor who gets 'lost at sea' nothing immediately comes to mind.

And I've already done the lost merchant thing for Earth. The last thing I want is a bunch of stories about merchants. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but its hardly epic heroism.

Now I do like the idea of a meeting between different cultures, but I'm not ready to do the Bleyoki....so that leaves either the Simsaur's people, the God's people (and my instinct is telling me this isn't right for them), the Abysmali people or a wilder. A wilder would be convenient because it would help define them, which means it has to be the Simsaur.

Now the problem is that the Simsaur make lots of people. They're the masters at breeding and life manipulation, but a bajillion races is...excessive in my belief. So what exactly would they see as wanting in a human? The Simsaur are the oldest of the races, so in some ways they've got a grudge, but they've got a grudge against everyone since they've been eclipsed by everyone at one time or another. So I'm thinking dwarves, gnomes, goblins and a million little short races to be diminuitive. The mechanical aptitude of humans (the ability to figure things out) is something that makes them useful to the Abysmali, but the Simsaur don't need that. On the other hand, there has long been a relationship between Simsaur and human teachers which tells me that these diminuiative races would be the true masters of magic.

Which is a bit against the trope of Fantasy since elves are supposed to be masters of things. But then again...the Sopensen would actually teach their people things, whereas the Dwarves would only be given a few bits and pieces. And their magics are totally different.

It seems a fit, but we'll see.

Air Apparant

Meeting with Ken this Thursday to plot out the next step of the 4th Novel (Pre Cyber). Some progress but not a huge amount.

Fire has been submitted and rejected; waiting to hear back from on Vance. I won't further report this kind of thing unless its accepted simply because it long, tedious and a little depressing.

Earth and Water are slowly moving along. I'm torn between wanting to do a good word count quota and making them GOOD, and right now I'm leaning a little bit on the making them GOOD side of things.

I've done the 'trickle' method with multiple stories rather than focusing on a single story before and I think it works kind of good. Course I need to finish one before the next Writer's group meeting but I think I'll be able to do that.

Tis the week to start designing "Air" which in this case I think means that Sopensen. I think the latter period, after the Flotsam novel interests me more; and needs the most definition. In fact, while I won't use this part directly in the novel there's a part that sings to me for placement in what I will eventually write later this year.

I speak, of course of the 'elves'. Should I even call them that? I imagine the humans of Glashause would. They would probably not call themselves that though. I could see themselves calling themselves Scions or something like that. To them 'elves' would be the Sopensen.

Status

Working on Earth and Water right now. Because of other things, I'm taking the trickle writing approach rather than focusing. Need to move these things along and I'll be designing Air next week. Fire and Vance should be shipped out either tomorrow or Wednesday. Probably tomorrow. Feedback and writing group definitely helps.

I've sent Ken my half of 16-20 in the Pre Cyber book. It's shaping up to be something pretty good. I think we're about 35-40% of the way there to a first draft, which will be very very nice.

Earth

The writing group went well. They gave me great feedback on Fire, though it is going to require a bit of a rewrite. I'm going to do that at the same time as water and start Earth this week as well.

Julie brought an old children's story that she wrote for her nephews a while back that is quite nice. Rita brought another chunk of her novel. This time it was an interesting anecdote about roller skates.

I'm still somewhat at a loss of what to do with Earth. However, I think what I'm going to do is have a human find the place long after the beavers are gone, and have the wild humans (except I need a different name for them) try to keep him from finding out the truth of what they did so long ago.

Role in the Cycle

So I'm thinking the woods in this case are natural enhancers of whatever exist within them. So the Hosted in this case, wouldn't really be changed. Since the Woods, or what would eventually become enchanted woods, were made by the Hosted, they already regarded themselves in their natural and perfect state. Animals would behave more like themselves, be more healthy, more vibrant and more...everything. A bird would be more bird like and a lion more lion like. It would create a healthy eco system that would at the same time reduce suffering.

With the ability to bring the trees to life within at their command (a given for such an enchanted place), it would be foolhardy for anyone to attack them during the dark times. Indeed, they would serve as natural resting places for questing heroes that eventually became human emperors during the light times, thus becoming natural preserves to a theoretically grateful new dynasty. Of course, they also had to have the ability to make trees grow with incredible speed to undo any damage done by the seige engines.

Indeed, the idea of enhanced humans raised in the woods is as old as fantasy, so someone who was a small child and raised by the Hosted could become quite powerful; stronger, swifter, smarter and more skilled at woodcraft than any normal natural human would be.

But until the end of Prophesy, humans were born, raised and then expelled from the Woods to fulfill their destinies as champions of humans. But what if there were multiple generations of humans born in such a place? Humans that become stronger, faster, and the most base animal instincts of all humans, lusty, Emo, passionate in every way imaginable. More Satyrs and Dryads than Centuars it seems.

And eventually the patient hosted would stand in their way one too many times, and the humans they had good naturedly kept sheltered from the storms ravaging the world beyond them would be killed, to a one.

Definitely the stuff of classic myth...now how to make a story out of it?