Category: About Writing

About Writing

Exploring What ifs

Autumn

I confess, when it comes to writing I often feel like I’m inserting things that most people are never going to notice.

Which is how The Scion Suit became a love triangle.

It’s not the stereotypical “Which guy will she choose?” sort of thing, though, because of the branching timelines. Carol never attempts to pursue both men in the same story arc. She’s not remotely the sort of character who would even think about doing such a thing, considering that she starts out completely asexual.

Aaaand I’m not remotely attracted to the sort of woman who plays/exploits multiple men. It’s a quirk of mine to write female characters that I would marry if I were a man, which drastically changes how everything plays out. Hence why Carol’s romantic prospects both make around $80~90k a year, and will never buy her any expensive cars or jewelry, lol.

Instead, it’s more about exploring a number of “what ifs”.

What if Carol’s human nature overrides the Commander?

What if Carol never gets back into the Suit?

What if Hartmann is the antagonist?

What if Lambert is the antagonist?

But since I’m not bluntly labeling each timeline with my underlying reason for writing it, I figure that most of my themes are going to slip by unnoticed. People are going to assume that I’m aiming for “Team Hartmann” vs “Team Lambert” and not realize that one of them works with the Commander, while the other fights against it.

Not to mention, Carol starts off as a blank slate, and the final shape of her personality depends on which man she interacts with the most, versus how much time she gets in the Suit.

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About Writing

Carol, again

Autumn

A bit of random trivia is that Carol was actually the name of the main character from the first novel I ever finished … when I was 14.

I technically still have the file, but it’s encrypted so it can never come back to haunt me, lol.

As you’d expect from a novel written by a 14-year-old, the main character was a Mary-Sue. She had unlimited magical abilities, fell head over heels for a handsome prince, but was tragically the daughter of The Evil Antagonist. So. Epic.

But, because I’m a MAJOR weirdo, I didn’t name her anything AWESOME like Silver Raventhorn or whatever.

I named her Carol.

Yeah … I dunno.

I guess I had a pragmatic streak back then, too.

My current Carol, with The Scion Suit, is not in any way related to or inspired by the original. I recycled the name because it fit as normal and average.

And maybe also as a nod to my teenage self.

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About Writing

Carol

Autumn

In this post, I’ll be discussing spoilers for The Scion Suit. If you haven’t read it, I recommend you click the link and enjoy a free story.

The big reveal at the end of The Scion Suit is that the main character, Carol, is a “seed” for a bio-mechanical alien race, and she has a chip implanted in her brain stem that allows her to connect and interface with her mechanical body — aka the Suit. The idea behind her characterization is that she starts off as literally half of herself, and is consequently a fairly boring and one-dimensional individual. The more time she interfaces with the Suit, the more she develops into a full person.

With writing different story branches, I’ve had some time to emphasize that Carol doesn’t have much going on. She has no obvious hobbies or preferences, and can’t figure out how to occupy herself when she’s left to her own devices. Heck, she gets abruptly plucked out of her life and doesn’t miss anything about it.

I’m going to go ahead and confess something here:

I feel like I’m writing a normal, average real life person.

I want to believe that real people are more rounded than that, but unfortunately one of the poignant lessons of 2020 was that, when stuck at home with no where to go, a huge number of people will spend all day watching Netflix and not much else.

How disappointing.

But I guess that since this is my little fictional world, I can pretend that everyone is far more interesting than they are in the real one.

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About Me, About Writing

Whining

Autumn

The air conditioner broke. ‘Tis the season of dead appliances, apparently…

And the weather forecast is promising a heat wave for the next few days. This matters because we have to order the part in for repair. Ha ha.

It might be better for me to spend the afternoons out on the patio, where I can turn on the misters to cool down. I have terrible heat tolerance.

Anyway, that’s enough whining for now.

…

Actually, no, it isn’t!

I don’t have any sort of aptitude for marketing. In fact, it’s such a foreign way of thinking for me, that it leaves me so drained and cranky that I end up completely nonfunctional for the rest of the day, then lose all ability to “follow through” afterwards.

I made some queries about how to effectively advertise over the past couple of days, and currently I have e-mails sitting in my inbox that I just don’t have the energy to open. I badly want to retreat to the kitchen to bake something sugary, and forget about the whole subject.

So I’m going to pull back for now. I learned one important lesson about Kindle keywords (use phrases instead of words) that will henceforth be applied to everything I publish, but I’m not going to sacrifice my soul for this. Heck, part of my long term “marketing” strategy was to publish a novel every year, and that ain’t gonna happen if I kill my creative energy.

Not to mention, no one enjoys a cranky mama.

I’ll probably make no-bake cookies to avoid turning on the oven while the air conditioner is broken. Seems prudent.

Anyway, I haven’t finished polishing up Alice and the Warden for official publication yet, and I particularly wanted to fix up the final few chapters where I was *obviously* fatigued when I wrote them.

And I’m working on The Scion Suit MULTIVERSE edition, lol.

I need to stick with what works for me emotionally, since I’m kind of a finicky hyper-sensitive sort that burns out easily. Patience is a virtue, and all that.

About Writing, The Scion Suit

MSG Hartmann

Autumn

Wow do I need to come up for some air.

If I had written Alice and the Warden at this pace, it would have been done in half the time. XD

One of the things that I’m really loving about doing TSS as a branching story is that I can more fully explore MSG Hartmann’s character. Originally, I created him with every intention of him playing a much bigger part. Then I realized that, logically, he’d be neutralized pretty quick, assuming that my military had any sort of competency. Like, if you can’t apprehend a severely injured man on your own danged base, then you guys are pretty pathetic.

My military isn’t supposed to be the best — they’re losing and desperate, after all, — but that’s a level of stupid that I wasn’t willing to go to.

I basically had to give Hartmann a cursory nod, then medically discharge him. Thank you for your service, and all that jazz.

But what if Carol had made a choice that sent the story in a totally different direction?

What if Hartmann was placed front and center, while Lambert was relegated to the sidelines? Brain damage and all?

So that’s what I wrote.

And the part that has my heart beating excitedly is that I managed to work in a survival in the woods scene. Finally, my past life has a purpose! Har de har.

Truth be told, sometimes I kick myself for how I let myself get wrangled into writing a story about the military. I’ve been researching and all that, but I don’t have the IRL experience to feel confident about what I’m writing.

About Writing

Navigating Fantasy and Sci-Fi: Finding Your Unique Niche

Autumn

I actually have a hard time knowing how to classify my writing. Oh sure, there’s the big picture ‘fantasy/sci fi’ tag, but I get a little lost in the subgenres.

For example, my concept story “THEM” is my idea for a time traveling romance. Only, it features a nebulous alien invasion versus sorcerers, and the main love interest travels back in time to coach the main character (who was brought forward in time after her original was killed by the aliens) on how to seduce his contemporary counterpart, except she’s a reluctant introvert with social anxiety. All while she’s nannying a 4-year-old prince. Cue gothic overtones.

Maybe I’m just not well read enough, but I haven’t seen any hints of other books that are remotely like that.

Am I my own niche?

Which is one of the reasons why it’s so easy for me to put off that whole “marketing” thing (not to mention, I don’t want to mentally drain myself so I can’t spend time writing every day, ’cause it’s the writing part that I love the most).

I also have a malfunction.

But sometimes I feel lost in the noise. There are a lot of danged writers these days, and sometimes I think it’s harder to convince people to read something for free than it is to get them to buy it. Like, da hek ppl?

Am I going to find more readers by demanding money? Is that what you want out of me?

Anyway

My husband thinks I’m better at writing sci fi than fantasy. It is true that I was exposed to fantasy first, and there is a possibility that I might have stuck with it out of habit, despite the fact that I don’t actually like “sword and sorcery” type stuff all that much; hence why my Order of the Magi all use the internet and conduct their business with electronic tablets. I also prefer to explore human nature, instead of ‘world building’ or any of the typical fantasy tropes, but I also don’t like Star Trek type stories, or “technology is the magic” sorts of things either. I guess that I’ve got a nerdy enough bent to me that I like a solid foundation in reality. I’ve probably just illustrated that I’m actually a very picky reader.

So … the sequel to The Black Magus will very likely have a more sci fi atmosphere instead of fantasy. Heck, I established that magic is mostly just learning how to muck around with reality’s programming code anyway.

The hilarious part is, I have zero intuitive understanding of today’s trendy technology. Smart devices and I don’t get along. At all.

About Writing

Adding Romance to TSS

Autumn

Quick recap: I wrote The Scion Suit in 2019 as a response to a writing prompt on Reddit that ended up being popular.

SO

While Carol and Lambert did develop some chemistry between the two of them during the course of the story, there simply wasn’t enough time for either of them to realize it consciously. Since this story was ‘unplanned,’ and was written while I was in the middle of working on The Black Magus, I kept it short and to the point, with the idea of returning to expand it into a full-length novel someday.

I’m a hopeless romantic. Honestly, sometimes it feels a little embarrassing to say, “I write love stories,” when so many people start groaning at those words, and I can easily imagine lurkers from Reddit reading this post and thinking to themselves, “She’s going to ruin TSS by adding sex!” (You know it! *wink wink*) But what can I say? It’s just who I am. A pervert.

Let’s be frank: Reddit was fun, but it wasn’t enough to keep me there. Ultimately, I found more joy in pursuing my own projects, even though they don’t get as much attention (admittedly, I don’t advertise). If you, as a reader, dislike things like romance, sex, and babies, then I’m not the author for you. I have five kids IRL, meaning there’s a huge amount of living out my fantasies and writing what I know going on, so naturally it’s going to permeate through my fiction.

I’m going to write my story arc where Carol and Lambert do everything right to end up [in bed] together, it’s going to be emotional and hot, and I’m going to love every second of it. So there. Deal with it.

Besides, there’s no point in trying to deny it.

I’m not exactly vanilla.

And the dynamic between those two is too kinky to ignore.

About Writing

In the Zone

Autumn

I wrote about 10,000 words of additional content for The Scion Suit in a week, which is *fast* for me. And, since the original was only 15,000 words, means that the VN is going to be *substantially* bigger (I’ve only added one alternate ending so far).

I definitely should have kept exercising over the winter, instead of letting myself get bogged down. But now I know just how important it is to my health (my blood clot resolved a few days ago, in case you were wondering).

Rules of living:
1. Stay hydrated
2. Keep moving
3. Magnesium

Anyway

I decided to write in my normal 3rd-person narration style since that’s what I’m most comfortable with, to be converted into a script later. And, in lieu of numbering each section, I titled them instead.

Highlights include:

Learning to Cuss
Kinky
My Girlfriend is an Alien
Actions Have Consequences
That Didn’t Go Well
Have I Gone Mad?

I’m probably going to eventually publish this stuff as a choose-your-own-adventure novel, since it includes events from Lambert’s perspective that aren’t going to be part of the VN … I got a little caught up in the story, lol.

I’m more than likely not going to be able to keep up that pace (I promised my kids a banana cream pie today), but dang it sure is nice to know that I’ve got it in me. But who knows, maybe I’ll be able to get this out faster than I originally thought.

About Writing

White Space

Autumn

This is probably pretty weird of me, but I love it when the white space between words lines up organically while I’m writing, and I always notice it instantly.

I added a pale yellow line for emphasis.

About Writing

Hatoful Boyfriend

Autumn

One of my most favoritest video games of all time is Hatoful Boyfriend, which is a categorized as a ‘dating simulator.’

Plot twist: You play as a human girl in a post-apocalyptic world that is dominated by hyper-intelligent birds. The puns are egregious.

And it gets weirder from there.

I know, I’m a strange person for loving the heck out of this game.

Which reminds me that I wanted to make a “Hatoful Boyfriend” shirt for myself…

Anyway, this game is what got me thinking that it would be a lot of fun to write a visual novel, especially because decent portions of it are spent reading events as they happen, rather than any per se ‘playing.’

I’m getting pretty excited over the idea of turning The Scion Suit into an interactive visual novel. I’m not planning on doing any art, at the moment, but exploring all of the ‘what ifs’ is … AWESOME.

And honestly, it’s a relief to be back in the realm of fantasy/sci fi writing. I missed it.

I also need to give Hatoful Boyfriend another play through, lol.