#WordWeavers 2406.10 — MC POV: if you could wipe something from your memory, would you do it? CW: Intense
Hypotheticals are valid only in quantum thaumadynamics, but I'll humor you on this one. I watched someone die, struck down on the street realizing in the same moment that had I not saved the evil beside me that had thrown the grenade he would be alive. The horror of the moment, the smells of smoke and the sounds of shots, return to me as PTSD episodes. It's triggered when I find myself powerless to protect the people I'm responsible for. It happens more often than you would expect.
Would I wipe away that memory? No. Without it, might make the same mistake of justifying evil. Especially when I see it in myself.
Citron is an arsonist. He likes to see things (not people) burn. He is also a gawky teenager who works to pay the rent for his aged parents, while trying to act cool around his coworkers. He dresses sharp. And he's employed by the mob. He's got plenty to fear, like keeping his fragile world together for as long as possible.
Lesser fears?
Girls. It's not like he can talk about his hobby or his job or comic books with them.
Well, not exactly. His boss is around his age, though a heck of a lot more mature. She especially likes how he can be all business and turn off his ego. She's incredibly cool, like that time she handled the constables that had been tipped off about their evening delivery. Best of all, she likes his talent. (Spoilers: It's magic.) Calls him her power-pyro.
#WritersCoffeeClub Ch 10 Nbr 10 — Do you revise and add more plot if you feel your story is too short?
Inklings was supposed to be a sudden fiction story, but 800 words proved insufficient to express a shy person's predicament with attraction. Adding more words developed the characters to where I could see a further ending, first to where they might misinterpret themselves into bed, and then again to where the love interest's past breaks into the present and the MC has to save his life with her magic. Now I see an epilogue, too.
Yes. Each change required a revision and backfilling earlier parts to create foreshadowing. This allowed me to add more plot.
Was it because it was too short?
Um... except for the 800 words in the beginning, well... dunno.
#WritersCoffeeClub Ch 10 Nbr 09 — How do you select ideas from all the ones floating around?
I require a character I can relate, to with an agenda to fulfill and a problem to solve. If that generates an ending I can write toward, it's "Tag yo it!"
Sadly, I sometimes write without an ending. Those rarely end well.
#WordWeavers 2406.09 — Who has the best meals in your story?
The main character's first non-vegetarian meal was crab cakes. Her marathon trainer insisted she needed more protein in her diet. Since then, her diet has been more like a day angel's than her own kind, which is a problem because day angels live on the top of buildings and any good day angel restaurant is going to be a rooftop restaurant. Her day angel friends and team mates fly her up to the best fish and chips places. I think she eats pretty tasty food, both sky and earth cuisines.
You'd think her antagonist would have the best meals, since in the worst case she could choose takeaway delivered from ten different worlds. (Okay, all but one of the colonies are non-earth-like planets, but still.) Problem is she prefers dessert. Not a meal.
#PennedPossibilities 339 — Does your MC learn from their past, or are they prone to repeating the same mistakes?
My MC is way too prone to making mistakes. Repeating them, not so much. Somehow she survives.
From the current work, this:
..."Better not to get hit?"
"Definitely. Though the direct route through an obstacle is sometimes more unexpected."
And:
Were my trust misplaced, I'd learn something about myself. But, then again, that seemed to be my method of operation: win—or get hurt, pick myself up, make different mistakes.
#WordWeavers 2406.08 — Where would your SC go if they had a bad day?
She's a day angel. Solitude is easy. Near sunset on the always hot world she lives on, she can always catch a thermal and spiral high into the sky. Gliding way above it all, the city she's trapped living in seems so peaceful, so devoid of people. She can make believe for a few minutes that the boss doesn't hold blackmail that would frame her for murder, and that she can soar off into the coming purpling dusk and start anew. The dry air swiftly dries all tears.
#WritersCoffeeClub Ch 10 Nbr 06 — Have you queried agents for traditional publishing? How did it go?
I met my agent at a writers conference, so technically I didn't query. It helped that I had a couple completed manuscripts with me. I appeared serious. I was told when I completed the next one, send it in. The agent sold it so quickly to such a good imprint that I didn't appreciate the miracle that had been pulled off. Nor did I appreciate the necessity of pursuing the career with intensity a lucky high school baseball player who makes it to the minor leagues needs pursue the majors.
That's the danger of getting a day job. A day job that pays well monetarily if not psychologically.
#PennedPossibilities 335 Part 2 — Do you use metaphors in your writing? What are some examples?
Yep, caught myself writing one:
...reading a CW forms in the reader's head a preconception without actual knowledge of the facts. It's a cudgel not a scalpel.
Not a simile. I could have written that a CW is as sharp as a cudgel to do that. Might still qualify as a metaphor, though. It is certainly an allusion.