'The Hundred Things'

For two years or so I've been going on and on about my hobby of writing 100-word prose pieces at 100words.com.

I will now be shutting up about it, because I've 'finished' what I'd been wanting to do with it. I've put them into a collection of one hundred 100-word stories.

I actually wrote quite a few more than 100, but a lot of them were rubbish. These are the decent ones, by my reckoning anyway.
Thanks very much to those who helped me with this. Really, to me (I have a very limited imagination) this was quite a challenge and I feel like a boss now.

Another 6100 words

I haven't written much this year at all. I finished the first year of my creative writing degree in May, and then promptly fell into a 'writer's block' that lasted the entire summer.

After starting a story five or six times and not getting anywhere I eventually decided to fall back on my 100Words.com entries. This is kind of interesting, because when I first began writing on that site, it seemed like a great challenge and now (after writing four months' worth of entires) it seems a lot easier and less daunting than the short story I had planned.

If I've never explained it or advertisied it at you before, then 100Words.com is a 'social tasking' website where writers, bloggers and others commit to writing a piece of exactly a hundred words every day for a month, no breaks and no exceptions. In my experience it gets tricky around two thirds of the way through the month.

Anyway, last winter I wrote four 'batches', with a general mix of rushed poetry, story ideas from my notebook and little 'funny' entries, which I ended up relying on. After the last one I decided that I was out of ideas and that I ought to end there. But I guess I thought up some more, because...


Here's two more! My August batch is here and rambled a lot and has a very vague theme about dreaming and celebrity... and my September batch (just finished) has an even more vague theme about school and childhood.


So there you go - I've written something. I am still technically a writer. And I enjoyed myself with these batches, too, even after I realised I had nothing interesting to say about school. But here are two of the more random excerpts that turned out all right:


1.

Catharine stared and wept for hours before she finally made a shaking V-sign with her fingers and dropped it onto the skin just above Jane's eyes. She dragged the eyelids down with far too much force, jamming them shut and pressing slightly into the pupils, like holes in a pair of bowling balls meant for someone more slender. She had expected less give, some kind of stretching sensation.

'Are you still a--wake?' Catharine was going to say 'alive' but caught it just in time. She already knew the answer, but she didn't see any need to rush it.


2.

My first partner had a saying about situations like this. Said there were three kinds of cops, regardless of rank. First there were police officers: the ones who pray their life is never on the line.

Then there were asshole cops. Guys who dream of killing some perp, just so they can sleep without jerking off.

And third, you've got movie cops. These are the people who plan for everything, don't enjoy it, and don't let on until it happens. And suddenly they're amazing. Heroic. And they truly save the day. And ninety minutes later, they're dead.

Well let's see.


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Thanks for reading. I've now written six months' worth (six seperate months, too) so I may return to this next year and end up with one batch for every calendar month. That'll be 36,500 words of flash fiction, so... maybe.

If you're a writer of any description, especially one who needs some practice or wants to get out of a rut - give 100 Words a go. I love it.

Happy October!

Quoth Darth Revan...

I know what you're thinking - once again these chuckleheads are talking about Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Talking about it with barely contained tears in their eyes, talking about it like it's their first wife who died tragically and who was also their childhood pet. Talking until either they die from talking about it too much, or else Bioware hires them to write a second sequel.

Every time I write a piece of fanfic, I tell myself, that's it. No more of this, now. I'm 26 years old, and it's time I put all my efforts into writing actual fiction, instead of flash fiction about Jedi knights.

Well, I've given up trusting myself on that one, but with a ny luck, this one will be my last fanfic. If so, I'm glad it's about Revan, and extremely glad it's a collaboration with Anthony Lowe AKA Knightfall 1138. See, it was Knights of the Old Republic that brought me to Bioware, and indeed to Star Wars, and then to fanfiction, and then to writing fanfiction, and to my transatlantic friendship with Knight, and to writing, full stop.

All those things will no doubt continue to be big parts o f my life, but I think it may be time for me to leave KotOR alone, and shut up about it.


Over the past week or so, Knight and I have been writing two short stories (which link up together, much like Voltron), in the 1st person and from the perspectives of (almost) all of KotOR's party members, remembering moments from the game, and giving a 'eulogy' to Revan.

The Summer of Applejacks. Notice how Zaalbar is gleefully preparing to decapitate Mission with a machete in this picture.

Here is Knight's - 'Of the Sacrifice'
And then mine - 'Of the Fall'


They're just little scenes, but we enjoyed writing them quite a bit, maybe because they allowed us to say 'goodbye' to a fantastically good Star Wars character, who we now accept is almost certainly not coming back from 'the unknown regions or something, I think he said he was out of cocoa' (thank you again, Obsidian).

It's about Revan - his adventure or her second fall to the dark side depending on which of the two versions you read. But it's told in the 'voices' of the other crewmembers and really (not so subtly) it's about how much Knight and I cherish that videogame, and miss those characters.

If you miss that game too and happen to read it, I hope you notice some of the little nostalgic details we put in there, and go, 'Oh yeah, I loved that conversation / planet / scene too'.

If not, thanks for reading this, the latest in my series of overly sentimental theses about pop-culture and computer games. One thing that I love about KotOR, and its sequel, is how beloved they are, by so many people. When I was looking for a picture for this article, I found hundreds of drawings of Revan and the rest, some of them slightly disturbing and most of them a bit odd, but all of them showing the same love we're trying to reflect with these stories. When we posted the first chapters, they were swamped and covered by competing KotOR stories within hours. Annoying, but wonderful.

I love that people are still going on about this stuff. You know that Revan will make appearances of some kind in the upcoming MMORPG The Old Republic, as he already has in the adverts for it.

But you won't get anywhere sitting around here, chatting up old men all day! Shoo! We should return our thoughts to the mission, please, you know? I will leave you be. I'm here, if you want something done right! You got it. Whatever HK said. Dwooooo.



Once again, here are the links- Of the Sacrifice, and Of the Fall.

We have two chapters each up so far - there will be about five each eventually, and will finish uploading soon.

12,000 Words

Yes it's another '100 Words.com' post from me. On the plus side, this will be the last one!

After writing exactly 100 Words of fiction / poetry every day in October, November, December and now February - I'm just about done with it. I've hugely enjoyed the challenge of it, and the unusual / difficult experience of writing such short bits. But now I'm out of ideas, I'm repeating myself, and I'm a bit bored of it.

So - here is the last little advert from me. My FOURTH BATCH of 100 word-stories is now done! Because it was February I went with the ingenious and original theme of 'love', and sometimes I even remembered to include it. There seems to be an accidental theme of 'whining misery' in there too, which caught me by surprise when I re-read them.

--

Like I say, I've really got a lot out of this curious online writing game. It's a brilliant website - I urge you to look through some entries (there are some amazing ones hidden in there) or better yet, write a 'batch' yourself.

I maybe might have another go sometime in the future, but for now I'm tapped-out and could do with writing something of decent length for a change. However, I like to think of all 120 of my entries as one piece - or at least four pieces - of writing. They kind of flow together and I even put a (very flimsy, extremely silly, half-arsed) motif in there which connects all four parts!

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One last plug for this.
Here are my 'batches' for October (Halloween theme), November (memory / remembrance theme), December (Christmas / Christianity theme) and February (love theme).

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All right. Thanks. For what it's worth, next time I post a writing update I swear it will be a proper story.

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100 Words Part 3: 9,200 Words

So damn close to 10,000 words... if only they would run an 8-day special event and I could have a round number!

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So it's the end of the month, and that means I have another batch of 31 100-word-long stories to show-off.
Last September, Battlechantress at the Fanfic Forums let us all know about 100words.com - a 'Social tasking' site, or a writing' game where, once you sign up, you must write exactly 100 words every day for a month. Some people use it for a blog, some people write poems, some stories, and some like Battlechantress, Knightfall and myself use it for a combination of them.

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This month, I wrote a Christmas and Christianty theme, as well as an ongoing fantasy story with a daft twist. I wasn't going to bother after October and November, but my mate Chris was doing it and I wanted to write alongside him.

So here is Chris' batch for the month.

And here is Chantress'

And here is Knight's excellent October one...

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AND - here are MIIIIIIINE.

My October batch (Halloween/superhero theme, ongoing mad scientist story)

My November batch (theme of memory / history)

And my all new, super-smashing December batch!

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After coming up with 92 ideas for these little pieces (some of them good, some of them clearly rushed...) I am exhausted. I have really enjoyed this game, and will almost certainly be having a few more goes sometime in 2011.

Till then, here's a few of my entries from this month:


1.

In the beginning was the word. The word was 'Strewth': God's truth. It was a contraction. It was the beginning of the evolution of language.

God had created Uluru, and around that he had created Eden. It was a land of desert and grass, which held and blended every facet of the beauty of the Earth. Monsters roamed and patrolled Eden, and coral lay around its edges like a halo, but more colourful. The people he would place there would be beautiful.

It was an experiment, a prototype. He thought maybe it was a bit much. But it was good.


14.

Sophia has one of those wedding dresses that actually looks kind of boring, plain. It's basically just an ordinary dress, except white. We could have bleached one of her regular dresses. But she doesn't need a fancy costume. Nothing could make her more beautiful t- no, it's a bad dress. I wouldn't have picked it.

She likes it, obviously. I catch her eye and she gives me her new smile. It's like the awkward, secretive one she gave me for ten years, but now it ends with her thrusting her head forward a touch, sweetly. Yeah. I finally won you.


25.

An angel watched over the spectacle of the messiah's birth, its expression unreadable.

This was not a handsome man with feathery wings and white clothes. Angels are indescribable. And I don't mean like you think that very lovely view you saw is indescribable, or the beauty of the girl you loved. I mean truly. It's not just that I can't describe it, either. I don't mean to use the word as an excuse for my poor vocabulary. Not this time, anyway. The angel was indescribable. Incredible.

The mother below held God incarnate in her arms and worried about a census.

Mock Effect 2 is up... again!

Remember when I recently announced Clint Johnston's 'Mock Effect 2', the sequel to my bizarrely-popular fan-parody of Mass Effect from a couple of years ago? I'm about to do almost the exact same thing again!

See - there is now ANOTHER Mock Effect 2. This one is written by James Mackenzie (under the screen name Jraym16.)

A few months ago, when I gave up my own aspirations of writing a 'Mock Effect 2', both James and Clint contacted me and asked for my blessing to do the second one and keep 'John and Jane' Shepard alive. Cleverly, I said yes to both of them. In my defence, both of them showed me very, very funny sample chapters.

James has actually been working on his version for as long as his rival, but as of this week he has started posting his work. And - it's still very funny.

So - here is the link to Mock Effect 2: The Other One!

It will be very interesting to see how the two authors handle the premise and characters they've both been writing simultaneously! So far both are amusing me a great deal.


--

And here is a sample from the prologue:

(Below decks, Lt Kaidan Alenko runs through the hallway in a miss-sized white and shocking pink armor. He struggles to get his helmet on which seemingly resembles some kind of death mask. Nearby him, several crewman die in more bizarre electrical discharges, making extremely canned scream sound effects in the process. He finally finds Commander Jane Shepard standing by the escape pods adjusting her own helmet with a new tinted visor.)

Kaidan: Shepard!

Jane: I wish people would use my first name more often. Oh well, I guess it’s better than ma’am. Anyway, the distress beacon is ready for launch. Not sure what good it’ll do but hey. Wait a minute, is that Williams’ armor you’re wearing?

Kaidan: Uh well, I um…er

Jane: You know what, I don’t want to know. But, what’s with the death mask.

Kaidan: Well, Williams’ has been into this emo thing recently…

Jane: So it is Williams’ armor.

Kaidan: OK. I swear this isn’t how it looks.

Jane: Explain later, we’ve got bigger problems.

Kaidan: Will the Alliance get here in time?

Jane: What, with several hours before Admiral BISHOPFROMALIENS gets this signal, a multi hour trip, and a ship raining a death laser beam down on us? Of course they won’t be here!

Kaidan: Oh.

(Kaidan starts spraying the nearby fires with a fire extinguisher. There is a post-it note on it saying “Do not remove from cockpit. –Joker”)

Jane: Get everyone on the escape shuttles.

Kaidan: Joker’s still in the cockpit. He won’t abandon the ship. I’m not leaving either.

Jane: Have you noticed the ship is disintegrating around us?! And why did no one pick up Joker on the way down?! He can’t even walk!

Kaidan: Well, I was trying to find the escape pods. I don’t remember seeing them anywhere on the ship before. There’s no directions or anything.

Jane: Alliance regs specify that escape pods be hidden away behind secret passages, like this one behind the sleep coffins of death.

(Another crewman runs by and is hit by an explosion.)

Jane: The regs also specify that power be transferred through exposed and explosive conduits. Just like back on the Endar Spire right? Oh sorry, I’ve been working on that.

Kaidan: It’s OK Shepard, you’re trying.

Jane: Alright, I gotta go get Joker. Get everyone to the escape pods Kaidan, now.

(She starts to walk away)

Kaidan: Hey Shepard! (She looks around) Thanks for getting my name right.

Jane: (smiles under her helmet) See you down on the planet.

Kaidan: You got it.

Dragon Age! The Musical

I remember seeing Eric Idle's musical Spamalot, based on Monty Python and the Holy Grail earlier this year. I had a good time, but I couldn't help thinking, Gosh! This is fun and all, but if only it were more like my own masterpiece MOCK EFFECT BY MISTER BUCH, the parody that took the world by storm.

Well! I don't know why he hasn't posted anything about it, but Knight has been writing a script parody of the beloved Dragon Age: Origins.

I love script parodies, and this is a very fine one so far. It's about time Knight wrote one!
Sadly fanfiction.net doesn't accept anything in script form because it's beneath their high quality standards (however they do accept porn stories about Pokemon).
But we can at least advertise it here, for what that's worth ;)

Here it is - Dragon Age! The Musical

And here's a bit of it:


[You, That Guy, and That Other Guy sit down while Alistair moves to stand next to the altar.]

DUNCAN: As part of the Joining, Alistair will recite the words that have preceded this ritual every time since the beginning. Alistair, if you would.

[Alistair clears his throat and lowers his head.]

ALISTAIR [solemnly]: Na Na...Na Na Na Na...Hey Hey Hey...Goodbye...

DUNCAN: And so we proceed. You, That Guy, please step forward.

[Duncan holds out a chalice filled with lyrium-enriched darkspawn blood.]

THAT GUY: You...want me to drink that?

DUNCAN: It is the blood of the darkspawn that gives a Grey Warden their power. It allows you to sense the taint, giving you the ability to sense the darkspawn themselves. It's completely safe.

THAT GUY: Really? It's safe?

DUNCAN: Oh my, no. Down the hatch.

ALISTAIR: Drinking the blood gives us the only tool capable of impeding the darkspawn advances.

THAT GUY: I don't see how. How does being able to sense an army numbered in the thousands give you any sort of advantage? That's like being able to sense when it's going to rain.

ALISTAIR: Well, you don't have to, I guess. We thought you were a cool guy, but I guess we were wrong.

DUNCAN: Indeed. He did seem like a cool guy when I invited him to join, but that does not appear to be the case. He's lame.

THAT GUY: That's not true! I'm totally cool! Watch!

[That Guy drinks the entire chalice and slams it back on the altar. His smile is wide for a moment, until he begins to feel the effects. He crumples to the ground.]

THAT GUY: Damn you...peer pressure. You've done me in again...

[He dies.]

WARDEN: Wowsers.

THAT OTHER GUY: No! No, no, no!

[That Other Guy withdraws.]

THAT OTHER GUY: No, I won't do this! You never said anything about this!

ALISTAIR: That's too bad. We thought you were a cool guy.

DUNCAN: I, too, thought he was cool, but he appears to be nothing but an anti-Fonz.

THAT OTHER GUY: No, I won't give in to your peer pressure so easily.

[Just then, Duncan sprints from the altar, descends on That Other Guy, and drives his blade through the man's gut. As the life begins to drain from That Other Guy's eyes, he spots a cherry blossom tree on the other side of the platform. A breeze whips through its leaves, sending pink pedals into the air.]

THAT OTHER GUY: ...Perfect...[He slumps.] They are all...perfect...

[He dies. Duncan wipes his fingerprints off the blade and places it in That Other Guy's hand.]

DUNCAN: It was suicide. You all saw it, right? [He glares at you.] Right?

WARDEN: If I can get through this Joining without dying, then I didn't see a thing.

DUNCAN: That's what I like to hear.

100 Words - November 2010

This is just a post to boast that I'm done with my second batch of '100 Words' - here's the link.

That's 30 super-short stories or little poems, one for every day of November, each exactly 100 words (at least according to 100words.com's lousy word counter.) This is my second batch, and contains only two poems, no running story and one entry made up purely of YouTube comments, but I am pleased with how it turned out, much more than my October batch.

Sadly Knight didn't join / trounce me this month, but I was joined by my mate Chris - here's his entires.


I am doing December as well, so there'll be another one of these at the new year...

Mock Effect 2 is up and online...!

... and I am very impressed.

Regular readers of my blog entries will remember at the beginning of this year, me dilly-dallying about whether or not to write a spoof of Mass Effect 2, considering the bizarre and ego-boosting success of my parody of Mass Effect in 2007/8 - Mock Effect.
I spent ages going back and forth, trying to decide whether or not to do a sequel. I made a huge fuss about it and attracted a lot of attention to myself, which was secretly the whole point of the exercise.

But I was always quite sad that the concept and the characters of John and Jane Shepard died there, with my creativity.

OR DID THEY!

I really should have mentioned this ages ago. Fittingly, John and Jane have been ressurected by the beautiful Australian scientist/marine that is Clint Johnston.

Clint has been writing Mock Effect 2 for months now, and uploading each chapter as he goes. And honestly, it's very very good. If you enjoyed the first one - here is the improved sequel. It's teriffically funny, painstakingly well-observed, and very kindly brings back the Shepard twins exactly as I wrote them. It was a very nice moment when I first started reading this - seeing those characters still going and still just the same.

Because fanfiction.net doesn't allow script-format stories/parodies, Clint has been uploading at Bioware and the Mass Effect Fanfic Forums (the home of Mock Effect 1).

Here's an excerpt :D

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(The Turian in front of them holds up a finger, and the team waits impatiently as he takes out the last remaining mercenary. He then turns to them and dramatically removes his helmet, revealing GARRUS VAKARIAN)

JOHN: Oh shit. I’m out of here. Hey, guys, you can kill him now. We’re sorry!

JANE: Not so fast now. Maybe he’s not as boring as he used to be.

GARRUS: Guys, I’m right here. I can hear you. How come you aren’t dead?

JANE: We’re not… anymore… I think. I’ll explain it later.

JOHN: No thanks to you, Mr. I’ll-Shoot-My-Rescuers…

GARRUS: You were part of a heavily armed attack force that has spent the better part of the last few days trying to kill me. I was supposed to notice you were different? Thanks for shouting that out by the way, I got in a lot of shots at shocked mercs.

JANE: (dryly) No problem. No offense, but what the hell are you doing here? In Game 1 you at best a mediocre human shield, at worst, you were nearly killing hostages.

GARRUS: Don’t worry, I still do that, but I’ve picked up some new skills. I got tired of C-Sec and all it’s bureaucratic crap…

JOHN: Oh come on, not this again!

GARRUS: So I decided to come out here and lay waste to all the criminal lords in the area. Back at C-Sec, we never had decent sniper rifles.

JOHN: (suddenly paying attention) Actually, that doesn’t sound so bad. Shooting people interests me.

JANE: I don’t imagine that went over well.

GARRUS: Er… no. I’m throwing a major kink in their operations, not to mention the fragile local economy. But killing mercs is hard work. I’ve had to study up on gangland tactics. Would you believe that Eclipse uses cement shoes for disposing of undesirables? It’s all very impractical. Have you any idea how long cement takes to mold?

JANE: (mutters) Probably as long as it will take archaeologists to find our bodies. (aloud) How did you wind up with the name Archangel?

GARRUS: The locals gave it me for… for….(searching for a logical reason) all my good deeds.

(JANE raises an eyebrow)

GARRUS: (sigh) I don’t know. It just sounded badass. “The Punisher” was taken. I tried to call Wrex for some name ideas but he’s been very busy lately. Something about his new writing career.

MIRANDA: Well, if you three are finished with old home week over there, the robots climbing over the wall might need your attention.

JANE: Well it was polite of them to wait until we ran out of topics.

JOHN: Ooh, robots. Can I see?

(GARRUS hands him the Sniper Rifle. JOHN headshots a robot, exploding it in the middle of its compatriots. JANE, MIRANDA, and ZAEED join in, leaving nothing but spare parts lying around.)

GARRUS: I’m just going to take a nap on the couch over here. You guys keep up the good work. (Immediately falls asleep)

JOHN: Jackass. He thinks withstanding a siege for days on end gives him an excuse to nap?

JANE: Well… remember the Alamo! Let’s get ready to fight!

Serenity will rise again

Knight made me feel pretty good the other day when he put up a link here to my new fanfiction. Luckily, the situation is right to return the favour.

Knight's Firefly new fic, 'Take the Sky' is, I think, the best fanfic he's written so far (well maybe except for The End is Neigh), and also the one he's working on now!

If you like Firefly and weren't happy with letting Mal's story end the way it did in the movie... as Knight was not... then..... here is a Frefly fanfic that's better than some episodes, I swear by my pretty floral bonnet. Read it.

Take the Sky

STAR WARS! And... new fic: A Thousand Generations

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away....
Grand Moff TARKIN tirelessly searches for Rebel threats to the evil GALACTIC EMPIRE. Meanwhile at the dark heart of the Empire, middle-aged pilot MARI DALTO recovers a forgotten relic of the Jedi knights....

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Today is the anniversary of the release of one of my very favourite movies (and I know Knightfall loves it too) Star Wars. AKA Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

It's just such a brilliant film - the perfect, fun action film. It's a tongue-in-cheek but lovingly-crafted homage to Arthurian legend, Kurosawa's samurai movies, Westerns, World War 2 films, medieval fantasy, classic science-fiction and, best of all - the old Flash Gordon adventure serials. It shamelessly steals concepts, characters and scenes from all of these, but mixes them together so beautifully. It has Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Alec Guiness in it, it has one of the best music scores you'll ever hear in your life. There is a fighter-plane dogfight, there are shoot-outs... robots... a saloon with crazy aliens in in. The villains are Peter Cushing and a seven-foot tall, half-robot, black-armour-wearing space Samurai with magical powers, a red laser-katana that he wields like a broadsword, and the voice of James Earl Jones.

We've talked about Star Wars a lot on this blog, but with good reason. It's such a big part of sooooo many people's childhoods. It's a pop-culture phenomenon like no other, and changed movies for ever.

And I grew up watching it, over and over and over. And I never got bored. Here I am, so many years later, watching it yet again and barely to take my eyes off it. Earlier today I was reading a novel based on it, and after that I wrote a chapter of my fanfic based on it.

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Yes, my new Star Wars fanfic... is HERE!

I just launched the story on fanfiction.net - and just a minute ago realised that today is the original movie's anniversary! How's that for timing, eh? It's the will of the Force, man.

I swore I'd finished with fan-fiction, but I always felt there was one fic I should have done. Or should have finished. I had the idea for 'A Thousand Generations' years ago, and worked on a couple of versions of it, which were all abandoned.

Now I'm writing it for real. It's a short (about 10 chapters) adventure story, set a couple of years before the original film, and attempting to tap into its style. Like the first movie, it's about a confrontation between the evil Empire and the American Rebel Alliance. And like the movie, it's told from the perspective of two ordinary people who get dragged into the fight.

It's about a middle-aged transport pilot (space Fed Ex) and her part-time student employee who find an old Jedi lightsaber and get mixed up in the Rebellion. It's about the war, but the subplot is all about the Jedi - specifically I'm trying to explain why various characters in the film don't 'believe' in the Jedi and the Force, only twenty years after seeing Samuel Jackson being hurled out of a wndow by lightning.
So - it's a fun, dark adventure story, with a lot of mention of the Jedi's role in the 'dark times' of the original films.

I've been trying to capture the spirit of that first film - the space battles, the heroic Rebels and hero's journeys, funny droids and fiendish, Nazi-like villains.

If you're interested, please give it a look! This really is a labour of love for me. It's supposed to be my last entry on fanfiction.net - a final attempt before I commit to writing proper, original fiction. So - this one honestly means a lot to me.

If you read, I really hope you enjoy it.

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Anyway - read my fic! And also - enjoy the Star Wars anniversary celebration day, thing! Here's a really nice litte video that just talks about the original three films, their varied influences, and the effect they had on several generations of nerds, kids and film fans....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25zE6cs2vtw&feature=related


M.B.

Buchanan Writes Again

This is another of the more personal entires from me. I've had a sort-of writer's block (or a lack of interest in writing) for a while. I suppose it's more a lack of confidence, actually.

As a consequence, all I've written lately has been a poem, a bad fanfic and a very short story which was experimental, and I really dunno how it turned out. I guess I've been kind of disheartened lately, for various reasons, and I got into the habit of reading instead of writing. After I got tired of that I got to playing games again.

So the upshot of all this is, I'm working on a new story! Not fanfic, either. I want to get a couple of original pieces of work under my belt before I start my English degree in September.

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This one is a sci-fi short, but science fiction in the literal sense, not space opera. It's set in a future where robot workers have all but eliminated the need for human labour. As people struggle to fit into the new way of life, somebody takes advantage and builds all the robots to be 'male'. The story is about Elise, a lonely woman who makes a life-companion of one of the robots, and obsessively attaches herself to it.

(Holy crap... it's Kimberly Brooks! Good actor, hey!)

I guess I'm stealing the setting and concept from I, Robot and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? It will have that sort of feel to it, anyway. But it's also allegory about sexism being inherant to societies. I'm still working out my plot, and trying very hard to get my Feminist point across, and to not make it look like the exact oppisite. Allegory is hard.

It's been a while since I really put my all into a story and was completely proud of the result. I think it's time to stop moping and do it again.



Looking back on my computer... I realise I actually started this thing last July! Bloody hell! I'm going to re-design the story and write this. I need an ending...

The title will be Synthetic Autonomous Man. Indulge this post - I'm a lazy artistic soul, woe is me until the muse takes me, etc etc.