Colonising Minds: Challenge #5
Start here before doing this challenge.
The colony’s big challenge is over, one way or another. It made it through or it didn’t. The dust has settled. A year has passed since then, a whole cycle of the seasons, a turn of the sun, and a visitor is approaching the colony’s borders.
Why is this person coming to the colony? Is it a planned trip, or a chance visit because they happened to be passing this way? How did they come to be here, and by what means? Do they have a purpose in coming – news, or supplies, or the start of the next wave of colonists? Are they alone, or part of a group?
What is the first thing that this visitor sees? As he or she progresses into the colony, what do they find? Is it still very crude, or starting to look like an established town, or indistinguishable from a city that has been around for decades? What do the people look like, seem like? Do they welcome a stranger with open arms, distrust, relief, or hostility?
Is there anyone left to welcome this visitor at all?
Follow this person through the colony. Picture the places he or she sees, smells, breathes in. What impression does the visitor have, and is it borne out as they move on through, deeper into this place? Is there any sign of the hardships that the colony has been through? Does this person achieve what they set out to by coming here?
Show us this person’s visit to the colony, and give us a hint of what it might mean for the colony’s future.
Finish up: Epilogue
Colonising Minds: Challenge #4
Start here before doing this challenge.
No plan ever goes smoothly. No group of people will live together without trouble, not for long, even with a common purpose. Small issues can be dealt with in small ways, but eventually, something big is going to come along. It could be days, or weeks, or months, or even years after that first breaking of the ground. This thing will give your colony its first real test, and now, it’s make or break time.
Think about what that first big problem might be. It could be a failed harvest, or a supply train that never arrives. A spoiled or poisoned water supply. It could be a malfunction in the terraformer that stops it from converting the atmosphere, or a hole punctured in an essential dome. It could be a clash with a native race or species. It could be a sickness that no-one has a treatment for yet. Or it could be something more sinister, like large-scale sabotage or terrorism that undermines the establishment of the colony.
Whatever it is, it poses a real threat to the continued existence of the colony. Choose your problem and consider what its repercussions mean. It’s sink or swim time, but what does sinking mean for these people? Going back home again, or something more fatal?
Consider how the colony reacts. What does the general populace think about it? Are they aware, or has it been hidden from public view? What about those in charge: what is the first thing they do? Do they have the capability to deal with this issue themselves? Were they at all prepared for this type of emergency? Are they forced to ask for help, or make sacrifices, and are they willing to do it? Does everyone agree with what must be done?
Tell us about the colony’s first big challenge and how it makes it through – or doesn’t. The colony’s fate is entirely in your hands.
Next up: Challenge #5
Colonising Minds: Challenge #3
Start here before doing this challenge.
The long journey is over. Your colonists have finally arrived at their destination. It might be the planned location, or a chance happenstance of the right conditions, or just the place where they finally had to stop. They are here, and now it’s time to break ground on this new home of theirs.
What kind of ground is it? What is it like here? How much work do the colonists have ahead of them to get themselves established?
How does it compare to the place they set out from? Is the contrast stark? Is it comfortingly or disturbingly familiar? Is it what they thought it would be? Are there any surprises waiting there for them, and if there are, are they good or bad surprises? What is the general mood of the colonists as they stop moving and start settling?
Consider the characters you focussed on in at the start of the journey. Did they all make it? For those who did, how do they react when they finally see their new home? Are they relieved, disappointed, elated, excited, scared of what lies ahead, or regretting their decision to come here?
Tell us the story of the laying of the foundations of their new home.
Next up: Challenge #4
Colonising Minds: Challenge #2
Start here before doing this challenge.
It has arrived: the day when the first colonists set forth on their journey. There is a long road ahead of them, but how will they travel it? Do they have ships loaded with supplies and equipment? Are these land, sea, or space ships? Burros and donkeys? Or are they restricted to only what they can carry or drag themselves?
What is the nature of this departure? Is there a fanfare and a marching band to lead them out of the gates? The hiss of separating spaceships? Champagne and shattered bottles? The quiet slipping away into the night to escape from where they have come from? Might they be chased out onto the road? Or are they just another group setting out on another journey, unremarkable in the scheme of things?
Focus on one or two people in the caravan about to set out. Who are they? How are they feeling as they gather their everything and get ready to leave? Are they daunted by the road ahead, or elated to finally set out, or frightened by what might await them? Are they sure they’re doing the right thing? Are they sad about what they’re leaving behind, or hopeful about where they’re headed?
Tell us the story of their first step on the long road to a new home.
Next up: Challenge #3
Colonising Minds: Challenge #1
You’ve read the setup and got your colony in mind.
Let’s go back to the colony’s first beginnings. Not the first foot on the soil or landing, but before that: let’s go back to the thing that drove it into being. There was, at the start of it all, a reason. Ask why: why would a group of people choose to leave on a long road leading to the longer job of setting up a new colony? Why would someone pay for such an endeavour?
It’s also worth asking whether these colonists are moving to or away from something, or both. Are they fleeing oppression or discrimination, seeking a newer, freer life? Are they moving from an overcrowded world into uncharted – or at least un-congested – lands? Are they looking for new resources, or exploring new frontiers?
Consider the effort to bring this project to bear. How public was it? Did it have to be conducted in secret? Was it crowdfunded? Was there a single benefactor, or a heap of government funding?
How were the colonists recruited? Was everyone welcome, or did they have to apply? Was there a lottery? Did they have to be invited explicitly? What about families?
Behind it all, who was driving it? Think about this person – or, if it was a group, think about a single person in that group. Why are they not only a part of this project, but also a leader of it? What is driving this specific person to push this colony into being?
Follow that person home. Think about where they live and how they conduct their time. Now tell us the story of that person, of how they came to be a leader of colonists in this brave new endeavour, and how this project came to be.
Tell us about the genesis of it all.
Next up: Challenge #2
Writers’ Asylum: Colonising Minds: Prologue
Will your colony start like this?
(Picture: The Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft. Photo Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)
Welcome to the Asylum. Settle in, make yourself comfortable; you’re going to be here for a while.
We have a lot to get through today: 5 challenges, each with a goal to write 1,000 words in an hour.
This year, we’re trying something different: a series of connected challenges, building up a single world and a single story. These challenges are intended to be done in order; it will make much more sense if you do.
I’m going to ask you some questions, guide you through some decisions, and help to build a picture in your mind. People, places, situations. From there, I’m going to ask you to write about a specific aspect of the situation in front of you.
Ready? Let’s get started.
Today, we’re going to establish a brand new colony. Step by step, you’re going to break free of the comfort and security of an establish community, you’re going to strike out on your own, cross wildernesses and vast open spaces, and at the other end, you’re going to set up a new home. Over today’s five challenges, you’re going to tell the story of this colony.
First, think about the community and society where it all begins. All colonists come from somewhere originally. Think about the era it’s in: it can be anything you like, from ancient Vikings to the tall ships of the 17th century, from magical medieval lands to far-future planet-hopping. It could be a contemporary setting, or near-future, trying to squeeze something new out of an already fully-claimed planet or foraying out into our nearest heavenly neighbours.
Next, consider where your colony will be located. Is it a foreign land, or planet, or climate? Is it at the bottom of the ocean, or huddling inside the warmth of an old volcano? Is it ice-bound, or the temperate rolling of fertile fields? Think about the distance between this new colony and its origin.
You have some idea of what your colonial effort will require now. Equipment, supplies, sustenance. Skills and people. It’s no small endeavour, no cheap feat. You are starting to get an idea of what it might take to make this thing happen.
Next up: Challenge #1
Inkspired: shiny new toy
Get Inkspired!
(Picture: theirs)
I have been involved with a new publishing venue for a little while, and I figured that it was about time I shared it with everyone. It’s still in beta, but that doesn’t mean you can’t jump in and see what it’s all about.
It is called Inkspired, and it is a free, serial-friendly publishing and reading portal. It’s pretty simple to use: as a writer, you copy in your story, fill in a few details, and click ‘publish’; as a reader, you can read stories on the website or through the app.
(Tip: not to be confused with the tattoo magazine of the same name.)
Let’s get the scary legal stuff out of the way: Inkspired don’t take any rights to your work; it all stays with the author. You’re free to do whatever you want with anything you post up there and you’re not tied to them in any way.
As a writer, Inkspired offers:
- An easy-to-use interface.
- Basic text formatting only. If you want something complex, this probably isn’t the venue for you.
- Access to their readership*, through:
- Their home page
- Discoverability / searchability
- Weekly bulletin emails
- Automatic notifications to readers who follow your story, whenever a new chapter is published.
- Automatic reminders when you’re approaching your next chapter due date.
- The ability to send broadcast updates to your followers.
- Reviews on a chapter before it is published**.
- Comments from readers on published chapters, and the ability to reply to them.
* The site is pretty new and the reader base is pretty fledgling-sized. I’d be curious about their actual numbers and how it goes as the reader base grows.
** This is a new feature, added for a recent event I held for them. Writers can get comments directly on a draft of a chapter from invited Inkspired users. It’s great! Some functionality still being ironed out here, though.
I think it’s a professional-looking site and pretty reliable. The creators are open to feedback and have implemented a bunch of features from suggestions. There’s a donation system on the way, so readers can donate to their favourite authors/stories, and likely to be other features in the works I haven’t heard about yet.
Overall, I’m still not sure what I think about it; it’s early days. I like the site and the interaction with the readership. I like that it’s easy, and looks good without much effort on my part. I like that people are discovering my stories on there (more on them soon!), liking and following them, and I get happy little notifications when that happens.
It’s still growing and developing, and it’s exciting to see it shift and change, especially when I get to have input into those changes. At this point, I can’t really tell how the long term or the big picture is going to pan out. Is it a good publishing portal? Will it be successful? I’m not sure and don’t really have the direct experience to predict it. I hope it does work out.
Right now, I’m treating Inkspired as an experiment for me, my writing, and publishing. I’m trying different things, and trying to get the word out there to see what input others have on the subject. Already, I’ve had it compared to Wattpad and realised that they’re fairly similar. As a result, I’m considering doing a compare-and-contrast with Wattpad, just to see what’s what.
As part of my work with Inkspired’s creators (they are local to me here in Brisbane), I ran an event with them recently that we dubbed the Write – Review – Publish event. It went well and was an interesting endeavour, and I hope to do something similar again soon. I’ll write more on this when I’ve had a chance to digest it more fully.
Hopefully, there will be a lot more news on this front over the next little while. Fingers crossed! In the meantime, I’d love to know what you think about Inkspired.
Asylum preparations
Wouldn’t it be cool to sail off in one of these, for lands unknown?
(Picture: scrimshaw drawing on a sperm whale tooth, courtesy of Wikipedia.)
It’s almost that time again: time to delve into the Writers’ Asylum, my day of writing challenges. It’s less than a week away now!
(All right, if I’m honest, it’s late this year, falling in May instead of April. This was due to some factors outside of my control and another event that cropped up; more on thay event later. But anyway!)
The pencils are sharpened, the straightjackets have been washed and pressed, and I’ve got the keys to all the doors. I think I’m just about ready!
Okay, I’m kidding. I haven’t really sharpened any pencils. Who gives asylum inmates sharp things to play with? Seriously.
This year, I’m trying something different. Following feedback last year that it might be fun to try linked challenges rather than standalone ones, I have created a series of challenges that builds upon a single, central story. It was both difficult and fun to write.
That’s part of why I love doing the Asylum: I get to write the challenges. It’s my challenge to myself, because they have to hit a particularly difficult line in specificity.
I read them out to a group of people (anything from 10 to 40 people, if previous years are anything to go by) and some people pick them up from this blog, which means that these challenges need to speak to a broad range of writers. They have to allow people to go into a world that they can connect and work with. This means that they can’t lean too heavily in a particular direction; they need to account for different time periods, magic and technology levels, genres, feels, and preferences.
At the same time, the challenges need to be focussed enough to guide the writers towards something that they can write, right there, on the spot. 1,000 words in an hour. So it has to be packed with sparks that can cross all those boundaries above. The challenge has to push them, and also be about something specific.
Broad, but directed. Allowing for different approaches and options, and yet on the same overall topic.
It’s not an easy target to hit. I’m not entirely sure how successful I am, most of the time, but I think I get there. This time, because the challenges are all linked, it’s harder because I can’t make any assumptions about what the previous challenge has set up.
It’s also immensely fun. It makes up for the fact that I’m so busy running the day, I don’t wind up doing the challenges myself.
Which isn’t to say that they don’t give me ideas. They do! Perhaps one day I’ll get around to writing them. Right now, I’m just happy that this year’s Asylum is all set up and ready to go. The challenges are written and scheduled up on this blog, ready to post in tandem with the live event.
What is this linked story going to be about, you ask? I’m not telling except that it has a name: Colonising Minds. Take from that what you will. True answers will emerge on Saturday, 2nd May. Join us!
I’m ready. Are you?
End of an Era: Starwalker Book 4
Starry: she go ‘zoom!’
(Picture: mine)
This week, I posted the final update for Book 4 of Starwalker.
It was a liberating experience. More than any other book of the story, this one feels like it has had the longest journey. It has taken the longest to write (over a year and a half, from August 2013 to April 2015) and had an unfortunate detour in the middle, so that feeling is probably right.
It’s nice to finally get to the conclusion, to reach that point I’ve been striving towards for so long. I can sit back and smile, because I finished another novel-length story, and I like how it came out in the end.
The end of Book 4 was also destined to be the end of Starwalker. I’m not sure how public I made that over the time I’ve been writing the web serial, but that was always the plan.
Similarly, The Apocalypse Blog was only ever supposed to run for a year. With that serial, I got to the end and I was done. For Starwalker, when I started it, I had three novels planned out, and an idea for a fourth. By the time I reached the end of the third book, I knew what the fourth one should be. That was the bonus extra story. That was supposed to be it.
This is the point when I’m supposed to be closing up the web serial and moving on to other projects. I have a whole list of things that I’m working on quietly in the background, most of which I don’t want to stay in the background. I have a list of things I have yet to get to. Characters that I haven’t drawn fully yet and want to meet. Worlds I have sketched in my head but haven’t walked in. Stories and plots that bubble away in the back of my brain and try to push to the surface.
And yet… and yet.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve found myself less and less planning to say goodbye to Starry and her crew. I’ve found myself planning for a break instead (because after 5 years, I need a real break!). I’ve found myself pondering just where the story will go next, the paths that the ship will fly, and some of the things she’ll trip over on the way.
I probably shouldn’t have written in a freaky kitten and left it on the ship. Because who doesn’t want to find out what happens when you squeeze a black hole into a tiny, fuzzy cute thing?
Over these past few weeks, I have been second-guessing myself a lot. There has been a voice telling me that I should stick to the original plan and turn my focus to something else. Like those things that have been piling up, waiting for me to have time and energy.
Because why do I really want this story to continue? Is it sentimentality? I adore the characters in that story and I love poking them with sticks, but is that all I’ve got now? Is it that I don’t want to disappoint my readers by drawing the curtain closed and refusing to open it again, no matter how big their eyes get?
Or is it that I still have stories to tell here? Is there more in Starry’s journey that I want to explore?
This, really, is the crux of it. You see, I firmly believe that a story shouldn’t be drawn out past its natural end. I believe that if I don’t have a story to tell, I shouldn’t be writing it. I don’t want to write it because of pressure, or obligation, or to make a buck (my story is free; I’m referring to the books in a series that have clearly been written because someone wanted to sell more of the series, not because the writer had more to do there. You know the ones I mean.).
I don’t want to write the heart out of it. I don’t want the story to meander aimlessly, or for it to lose that spark that people connect with and love. I would rather end it with people wanting more, on a high note, than drive it into the ground and have it peter out before a dwindling and disinterested audience.
I want to be passionate about the story, and I want to be sure. That’s why this has taken me so long to figure this out. The short answer is: I am. I have more I want to explore here, and there are stories yet to tell.
[Warning: I’m going to get a bit spoilery here.]When I think back over the four books of Starwalker, Starry’s journey has been a rollercoaster, but is it complete? In the first book, she figures out who and what she is; not an easy task, given her nature. The second book is about understanding where she stands in the bigger scheme of things and deciding to fight for her freedom. The third book is about setting things right and breaking free of the circles – and company – that made her.
The fourth book is less about Starry herself and more about how she and her crew might define themselves now. It’s something of a pause in Starry’s story, the place they stop to try to put themselves back together again after the battles of Book 3. They’re not entirely successful, leaving the story almost as physically damaged as they started it. It’s really more about Cerces and who he is, when it comes down to it.
After four books, there are many questions left unanswered. Questions like: now that Starry is free of her company bonds, what will she do? What will her crew choose to do? Will they stay outlaws or try to build a life for themselves? The presence of Cerces opens up some options for them, most of which involve leaving human-settled space behind them. Will they honour their promise to him?
Cerces himself has a lot of adjustment and growth ahead of him, and his journey will be pretty important to the ship and her people. Plus there are some other dangling threads to be cleaned up, like the issue of the pirates and the evacuation of Earth.
You may start to see how, when I think about where the story of Starwalker will go and how much I want to write, I am starting to suspect that there are another two books in it.
Right now, it’s just a suspicion. What I am sure about is that there will be a Book 5, because I want to write it.
I have some work to do before I start, though. My approach to planning is loose at best, but I do like to do at least some. Book 4 suffered from a lack of it, I think, and wound up with a retcon to get it back on track. I don’t want to do that again. I need to get my head straight, have a clear idea about where this story is going, because it has a habit of blasting ahead regardless. (I blame Starry.)
To get the necessary pondering and planning done, I’m going to take some time out. I’m going to line up the next set of storylines so that Book 5 starts fresh and fast, with energy and purpose.
First, though, I’m going to take a break. I’m going to do my best not to think about Starwalker too much for the next few weeks, and focus on some other projects that are clamouring for some attention. I’ve got a few irons currently in the fire, and I’ll be posting about them very soon. I’ve got ebooks to re-release. Promotion to do. I might look at editing Starwalker Books 1-4 and publishing options.
I’m definitely not going to be idle!
I’m not going to rush things, which means that it’s going to take some time to get through my backlog and set up the next phase of the web serial. Like I said over on the announcement post on the Starwalker site: the story will be back in more than a month but less than a year. Right now, I’m not putting anything more accurate on it; let’s just see how things go.
The best thing is that I’m feeling really good about where my writing is right now. I’m so happy with how the end of Starwalker Book 4 came together, and I’m confident and optimistic about where it’s going in the future. I’m enjoying the release from the weekly deadline (though I’m still writing like crazy when I can), and I’m enthusiastic about the other stuff currently lining up to be written. Plus I’ve got some fun events coming up, a bustling social calendar with my writer friends, and I might get the chance to beat the publishing beast with a stick again.
So yes, the end of Starwalker Book 4 feels like the end of an era, but it’s also the start of something good. I hope to come back to writing the serial with this feeling (and who knows, maybe even a buffer!).
Like I said over on the serial site, thanks to everyone who has taken the time to read Starwalker. I write for you: it makes me happy, and I am incredibly grateful to have you as a reader. I hope you’ll join me when the story returns, and maybe enjoy some of the other stuff I’ll be working on in the meantime.
Onwards, dear friends! May the words dance to your bidding.
Changes afoot
I think we all have times like this.
Changes abound in my end of the world, changes that I have been planning for some time.
To tell the truth, it’s a relief to get started. Last year was something of a marsh for me: every step sucked and progress was slow, heavy work. I had a to-do list that only grew, and pretty much fought just to break even.
This year, it’s a different story. I didn’t set out to find a way out of the marsh, though I definitely wanted it. I threw myself into the yoke the same way I always do at the start of a new year, laying out the paths I want to tread and pushing to see how many of them I make it to. On I plod, one foot in front of the other.
It’s the things that come out of left field that are making the difference right now. It’s the publishing platform that asked for my input and help, which I’m using to get a new project out through, and which in turn has made me give that project a focus it hasn’t ever had before.* It’s the bad idea that turned into a pile of silly fun, and which is now turning into an experiment and an exploration.* It’s frustration and determination that is finally tipping me over the end of a problem and into the long slog of solving that problem.
Maybe it’s the looming end of Starwalker, too, the toil of five years of my life now. After struggling through the climax of Book 4, it is hurrying towards the end at a startling pace. Sometime soon, it’ll be done, and I will have to find something else to push me to write every week.
Change is coming whether I like it or not. But I do like it.
After all, I do have a to-do list as long as my arm. I have projects clamouring for attention, things I am itching to write, that I am excited to write. I won’t be short of things to do for some time to come.
But that change is for the future. I have a few more Starwalker posts yet to write.
A change I can make now is to move my web hosting, from its current home to a new, better one. I have been with the same web host for several years, but the cost and reliability aren’t suitable any more. It’s not cheap hosting and it has too much downtime for my liking.
I have been pondering a change for a while, done some research and found a good alternative. But it’s a big job. I have several websites that I maintain, including this writing blog, the Apocalypse Blog site, and Starwalker. There’s all that data to transfer, plus email addresses and DNS updates, new websites to set up, imports to do, making sure everything is running properly on the new server.
I’m taking it one step at a time. One site at a time. Over the last couple of days, I made a start and it was with this blog. The site has been copied and set up. All the data is there, from posts to pictures to comments. Right now, you’re reading it in its new home.
Of course, this blog has previously been a sub-domain of the main Apocalypse Blog site (writer.apocalypseblog.com). To move it on its own, and to get the new server set up, I had to use a different domain. So I finally activated a domain I registered ages ago but never used: my own name, melanieedmonds.com.
So update your bookmarks! I have forwarded the old address to the new one, so existing links and bookmarks will work. Over the next few weeks and months, I’ll gradually move all my other stuff over too. If a site goes own for a little while, it’s probably in flux.
Things are changing. Slowly, patiently. It feels good. I hope you all come along for the ride.
* There’ll be more about those in the near future. Wheels are turning!