I'm a Grand Designer of Make Belief

Okay, so I know that writing fiction ought to be a piece of cake, right? Especially science fiction or fantasy. It's made up after all. There certainly is a degree of easiness, but it's also hard. Yes, we're making stuff up for a fantastic universe that most likely will radically differ from the here and now. For me there is always an element of research and creating stuff, sometimes making me feel as if I'm some sort of architect or grand designer.

Case in point being my current story, Iron Falls: The Enemy Within. Even now, as the story nears completion I'm still creating and researching best possible examples that I could use for the global policing agency that Gene Bukowski finds himself on "detached duty" near the story's end and then throughout Iron Falls: Enemy Mine and in the third and final installment (thinking of calling that one Iron Falls: In My Honor). Designing a futuristic version of an existing entity is pretty easy, just alter things here and there and tada! But the global policing agency, which I'm calling the United Nations Marshals Service, is completely made up. The question here however is, how does it look like and what are its points of origins? That, my friends, is a very good question.

Iron Falls - Revisions... what?? But why?!

I just read a good entry from Shawn, the guy behind the awesome Echo 47 story about revisions. Not surprisingly, he doesn't like them; but acknowledges that it's a necessary evil and part of the parcel of being a writer. Reading his blog brought a smile on my face, as I too dislike them but accept them as part of the writing process. Still, once a story is written it's finished. You finish it, hand it over to the likes of e-Quill Publishing and Bob's your uncle. At which point you watch the money pile up. If I wanted to do that, I'd probably circumnavigate my friend's small press e-publisher and plonk my stories directly. After all, others done it.

But alas, revisions are important and an integral part to writing; whether it be fiction, nonfiction or academic.

Case in point being my story, which started of as Iron Falls and (after a number of revisions and proof reads by a select group of Beta Readers) has evolved into Iron Falls: The Enemy Within. The story is my pride and joy, but that's true for everything I've written, and had thought that it was the next best thing since sliced bread. A fellow writer reviewed it, and basically suggested I rework bits and pieces or be laughed at (or something along those lines). It was a move encouraged by my publisher.

So, for the last month I've reworked my story and sent it to a select group for a beta run. The good news, they liked the revisions and yet still pointed out a few snafus that need fixing. Not that I'll be doing any today, as Wednesday is generally time out and am going to see Fast Five with a good friend of mine and lunch.

Pulled out Iron Falls

The other day I talked about the need for good well rounded characters, and that my story Iron Falls kind of lacked them as I opted to go with a more action driven story. Well, after about a week online through e-Quill Publishing, I got my first honest review of the story. Let me just say that it's awesome to see that the reviewer in question opted for discretion over humiliating little old me on the big bad web. Evidently, despite long hours editing and getting it proofed by several others, there were still a few consistencies and typos found on the final copy. So, I pulled it after finding that no one has purchased a copy.

Does this mean that I'm going to throw in the towel, pack my toys and join the circus. Yeah, you'll be so lucky! Far from it, I'm going to fix what needs fixing and streamline inconsistencies that had nonetheless found their way into the submission. The reviewer was kind enough to provide me some pointers where I've gone pear shaped and where I did rather well, so it's going to be a lot of work - but fun work as I rediscover once more the basics of writing.

Characterisations

I'm a few pages from finishing The Second Ship, first of a three-book Rho Agenda series by Richard Phillips, and thought it be a good time to talk about characters. People often ask me what I write about, to which I have two available answers. The first is that I answer that I write primarily science fiction, and that my current project is a mixture of military science fiction and a techno-thriller that follows on from Iron Falls. Then, if their eyes don't glaze over, I say that I'd like to think that I write about people and their experiences.

That's write, people. A good story isn't about the setting and the writer's ability to plot a good story, though they definitely help. It's about the people that live within the settings and are part of the plot (and, in a pretty good story, such as my friend's Black Donald, actually drive the plot forward). After all, some of the most popular shows on television and in the movies are the ones where the characters are individuals that we - as the reader or audience - can relate to. Another writing friend of mine, Shawn Kupfer, was blogging about becoming an instant fan of the short-lived Firefly series because of that - the main characters.

Having said that, I'm a tad guilty of glossing over the whole character thing in Iron Falls. Ok, ok, so it's a tad ironic that here I'm writing how important it is to have good characters that we as readers can relate to, and go about admitting that I just glossed over them in my story. Admittedly, I was experimenting with a style more or less used by the likes as David J. Williams and Matthew Reilly - where characters take second to action. With my next story, which will follow on from Iron Falls, I'm moving away from that and it'll deal more with such characters as Gene Bukowski, Kevin Yamakawa and Emilio Heerdan.

But what about you guys, do you have any favourite characters (whether it be from a book, movie or series) and why do you relate to them?

Iron Falls

The 22nd century was to be a time of peace and prosperity, while
humanity moved out beyond its cradle that is planet Earth . . .

It was to be an era where lessons learned from an earlier time were to
be humanity's salvation to go forth . . .

It was a time for peace . . .

It was a time for unity . . .

It was a time new lessons to be taught, and old ones refreshed.

___________

The weekend was pretty busy for my friends over at e-Quill Publishing, as they were releasing three new titles at the start of this month. One of these titles was Iron Falls, a near futuristic military science fiction novella set in 2115 in and about the African continent. It's also one of those stories that had taken me on what had been an interesting journey that had me rediscover the joy of writing, relearn the basics and pick up new tricks of the trade. The fact that I was doing it with one of my favourite characters, Gene Bukowski, made it all the more fun.

Bukowski had been the star of many a story that I had written, and am glad to see him in print. So, what is the story about. This is what it says on my website:

September, 2115. Shock waves follow in the announced intentions of South Africa becoming incorporated into a neighboring continental union. Amid a media frenzy and general panic, as the country has managed to gain more displaced persons due to never recovering from the Third World War, the Afrikaner Freedom Front is determined to put a stop to this, and sends Emilio Heerdan out to test the resilience of emergency services throughout South Africa and neighboring Mozambique.

Sergeant First Class Gene Bukowski, a U.S. Army Special Warfare operator, and his team are uprooted from a mission in Mali when Heerdan's group kidnap the daughter of the NorSec Energy Secretary. Yet his mission proves more dangerous than his team can handle. Bukowski is therefore forced to seek aid against the Afrikaner's sinister plot. Aid that comes at a steep price.

Not bad if I say so myself.

Please go check it out and purchase a copy over at e-Quill Publishers, as it's only $2.50 in Australian currency.

________________

So, where to from here? That is a good question. I've started working on the sequel to Iron Falls, and there's the whole Project Lucky 13 thing I'm working on as well. So the rest of the month is going to keep me busy with two first drafts and rewrites. Tomorrow I have a job interview as well, so add to it nerves of waiting if I get it or not.