Last month I announced that this year’s serial story would be decided by your votes. I received 14 different voters and this year’s serial story will be:
A Science-Fiction Romance combined with a Comedy Fantasy. It will be told in the third person, will have 2 or 3 main characters who are human, must overcome some sort of Person VS Nature conflict, and there will be no time travel.
Database of the Ageless Kings
On a small emu farm in Northern-Ontario, Sophia, a twelve year old emu farmer, dreams of seeing the world. When she chases the escaped Hagrid (a particularly bad tempered emu) through a snowstorm, she gets lost and must seek shelter in a cave. However, this isn’t a normal cave but the crashed starship of the last Prince of the Galaxy.
She spends the next ten years visiting the ship, reading the royal fanfictions about the Prince, and slowly repairing the ship.
Things get interesting when, startled from finding the Prince in cryostasis, she accidentally launches the ship into hyperspace.
Look for Part 1: An Emu in the Cold, on January 17th.
Creating things is hard. Showing it to other people is like ripping a piece of yourself off and hoping people will like it. (Van Gogh understood and took it a little too literally.)
There’s no trick to taking criticism. There are rules however, (which I sometimes forget) the chief most of those is: Never engage or defend. If someone says that your setting sucks because of X, you smile and nod. Later you can cry and rant and scream, but to the person you smile and nod and even thank them.
The second rule is just as important. Don’t dismiss or accept criticism until you’re calm. Once you’ve gotten over the emotional reaction, you’ll be better able to judge if you should take the criticism to heart or throw it out.
As a writer, there are things that I do well. I can create compelling characters, silly jokes, and I’m pretty decent at adventure style stories. What I don’t do well is realism.
All this comes from a criticism of this years’ serial story. It was harsh, sarcastic, and a little condescending, but not wrong. I’m not a hard mystery writer. I’m also not practised at realistic fiction. Wargrave Island has been a little cartoony in the deaths and I’m ok with that. It’s been an experiment and it’s taught me that this isn’t the genre that I want to be writing.
If you’d like to help me decide what to write for 2017’s serial story vote in the poll below. So far we’ve only had 5 voters so tell your friends and decide what 2017 will be like:
What Should be the Genre of the 2017 Serial Story?
Comedy & Fantasy (21%, 3 Votes)
Romance & Science-Fiction (21%, 3 Votes)
Science-Fiction (14%, 2 Votes)
Science-Fiction & Fantasy (14%, 2 Votes)
Romance & Fantasy (14%, 2 Votes)
Romance (7%, 1 Votes)
Action-Adventure (7%, 1 Votes)
Fantasy (0%, 0 Votes)
Comedy (0%, 0 Votes)
Super Hero (0%, 0 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
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What Point of View should I write?
Third Person Limited (43%, 6 Votes)
Third Person Omniscient (29%, 4 Votes)
First Person (29%, 4 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
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What Form should the Conflict Take?
Person VS Nature (50%, 7 Votes)
Person VS Person (29%, 4 Votes)
Person VS Self (21%, 3 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
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How Many Main Characters Should Be in the Story?
2 (43%, 6 Votes)
3 (43%, 6 Votes)
1 (14%, 2 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
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What should the Main Character(s) Be?
Normal Human (36%, 5 Votes)
Non-Human (Alien, Elf, Dwarf, etc) (21%, 3 Votes)
Special Human (Super Hero, Chosen One, Magic user, etc) (14%, 2 Votes)
Personification of a Concept (Death, Liberty, etc) (14%, 2 Votes)
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