Moving on up

Well, a template redesign wasn't near enough for me, so I've decided to move to Wordpress to focus more on my writing there while leaving this place as a more personal space for my everyday lunacy. This site will still exist, but the majority of my posts will exist there from here on out.

Thank you for reading and I hope you'll join me at my new site: http://evilgoodwin.wordpress.com

Flash Fiction Challenge: Five Words Plus One Vampire

Hey everybody.

So there's a blog I read, "terribleminds" and the author sometimes puts up writing challenges. For a small distraction from some schoolwork, I thought it would be fun to try it this time. The challenge is to write a flash-fiction piece using 3 of 5 randomly generated words, plus include a vampire in it in 1,000 words or so.

Here's the link to the challenge itself: http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2011/10/14/flash-fiction-challenge-five-words-plus-one-vampire/

Sadly, I'm a bit too wordy. Not only did I go over the limit of 1,000 words . . . I did it twice. Actually, I almost did it three times, but I was able to finish with a final word-count of 2,952. Oops.

Oh well. At least I finally got to work on something new and since I rarely post actual work, here you go!

UPDATE (10-23-2011): Fixed some formatting to make it easier on the eyes.

NaNoWriMo 2011: Monsters

While I didn't finish last year (looking back, it feels like I haven't worked on that story for years), I will participate again this year. For the past two months, I've been trying to start my current story but I can only make it a few scenes before I restart it. The first time, I realized that I hated my main character, so I had to kill him and restart (I literally killed him in the first attempt. Just mid-scene wrote "Suddenly, the ground opens up and sends the young man hurtling towards the fiery pits of Hell"). Second time? I ruined him even faster. In my head he was right, but on paper he just moped about like a thirteen year-old. I didn't even bother killing him and just deleted the files. This time, I've outlined the work out and I think I can pull it off, so I'm going to start it over again in November. So anyway, here's the basic info for next month's project/contest.

"Why I Don't Like Fellowship of the Ring," "The Deadman," and A Hasty Explanation

I should be reading for school. Or trying to sleep for school. But I can't. I'm listening to some Lord of the Rings music to put me in the mood to finally finish that damn trilogy of books once and for all (I kind of just stopped in the second half of two towers. I guess I was annoyed that the book went from pages of battles and a ton of characters to just Sam, Frodo, and Gollum. I think my brain screamed "Think of the amount you just read, now imagine it with only the hobbits!" and I fled in terror only to finally return today). But that's not what this post is about. This post is about my newest idea. I will tell the basic idea below and then follow it with a disclaimer, because I know that one or two people might say "WHAT A MINUTE YOU DICK YOU STOLE THIS IDEA FROM--" And believe me, I know that this can be said because I realized it after I started working on it.

Story Ideas: Dreamer and Fantasy War

New Idea for a story:

A character dreams he is other people. Things he does in dreams actually happen the way he dreams them. Character is travelling in time with his dreams and affecting his future. It's like Quantum Leap. Wait. Shit. It is Quantum Leap. It became obvious as I wrote it out. Nevermind.


Other Idea:

Magic weapons that create powerful suits of armor, making wielders powerful tools of war. If weapon is dropped, however, the armor vanishes and they become unprotected.



The second one sounds good, I think.

NaNoWriMo 2010: An Unfortunate End

Well, with 15 minutes left in the month, I'm going to sadly call my attempt over, falling short of 20% completion. I could make excuses, but honestly, if I had pushed myself, I probably would have done better.

Having said that, here are my excuses.

1) 2 Literature Classes and another class called "Research and Argumentation" which demands an 8 page research paper a week can really sap the drive and motivation to write something for myself.

2) I spent way too much time on my notes and not on actual writing. The blueprints are there, but the crew had to reschedule.

3) School. Again. School. Always. School.

4) It's hard to make progress when you have to edit what you wrote while drunk or sleepy. Or both.

So yeah. What it comes down to is school ate up all of my time. If I wasn't writing for a class, I wasn't writing at all.

What does this mean for the story?

Not a damn thing. I'm not stopping this one. I might put it on hold to work on a short story or two to submit to my school's writing journal, but Maelstrom (working title) will be finished. Probably better now that I'm not just trying to throw in as much as possible as fast as possible.

I'll keep posting the status of it as I make more progress.

And I look forward to trying again in 2011 with something brand new.

Oh, and before I forget.

NaNoWriMo 2010 Word Count: 7070 words.

NaNoWriMo 2010: Day One

I started at around 1:30 AM.

I had to rename a bunch of characters as well as invent a couple, but the prologue is basically finished, save for an un-fleshed out scene that I will improve. I've also reworked the third faction to be split into two groups, depending on their careers. Sor'ran will be the ones who live in secrecy, while Mystics are the ones that interact with the other groups.

I'm going to stop for now (seeing as it's 4 in the morning) but I might add more later today.



1559 words and counting.

Fiction: Convenience

I'm bored and trying to kill twenty minutes, so I'm going to make something up real quick and just post it without editing it. Let's see how I do. Feedback would be nice. And I'm aware this will probably be lame, but oh well. Enjoy.

NaNoWriMo 2009?: Last Year's Entry (UPDATED 11-20-2010)

After delving through Google Docs, I found last year's attempt at the book. It is the same idea that I'm working with this year, so any notes for this year apply. The basic outline is about 98% different. Link will follow after the break.

NaNoWriMo 2010: The Artifact

This is my MacGuffin, the thing everyone wants in my story.

NaNoWriMo 2010: The World

This is a basic description of the world. Will be updated as it goes

NaNoWriMo 2010: Solomon

Solomon is one of the main antagonists of the book. I don't know how big of a villain he'll be in the first part, though, or even if his name will stick (it probably won't). More will change as I go through it.

Full description after the break.

NaNoWriMo 2010: MacGuffin Mystery Solved

So my story has a MacGuffin.

"Goodwin, you devilish rogue! What is a MacGuffin?"

I'm glad you asked. A MacGuffin is a plot device that drives the plot in fiction. Sometimes it's an object. Sometimes it's a person. Think of the briefcase in Pulp Fiction, the maltese falcon from... The Maltese Falcon, or the Grail from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The term was popularized by Alfred Hitchcock.

Basically, it's something that characters in a story all try to get. It does something amazing, or something horrible.

NaNoWriMo 2010 and Current Work

This is a long one, so bear with me.

What is NaNoWriMo 2010? It is a contest. Sort of. It stands for National Novel Writing Month. The goal is to, from November 1st to November 31st, write 50,000 words. Let me spell that out for you. Fifty. Thousand. Words. That's over 1000 a day. Every day. For a month. The Prize? There is no prize. Except for the fact that YOU WROTE A NOVEL. Here's the official website

I tried last year, failing miserably with a paltry 2481 words. I thought I could pull it off by writing off of this idea I had, just making it all up as I went along, following a premise that I hadn't fully worked out yet. It was awful. I made up characters on the fly and I only had a vague outline to work with. On top of that, my outline included a plot line I had not even attempted to flesh out. Needless to say, It was a train wreck of amateurishness. Defeated by my own style of "make it up as you go," I shelved the idea, wanting to get back to it after writing other things.

Bugs

Writing this here so that I can remember it. I want to post more of my ideas online to show that I'm not just sitting around all day watching TV. I mean, I am just doing that, but I also write.


So here's a brief synopsis:

In the future, a man and his partner are caught stealing from a drug lord. He lets them keep the money but has them both injected with microscopic machines that are encased in a slowly dissolving shell in their bloodstream.

In 32 hours, the shells will be fully dissolved, and the machines will become active and begin to eat them from the inside out. To make matters worse, one of them was injected 6 hours earlier than the other and will die in 28 hours. Will they survive, or fall victim to a sadist's game?


(Another idea was to not use robots, but finely ground dust, which would shred them to pieces. I may still go with this idea.)