Dark

Sorry, missed this one! I generally put on Pandora to whatever mood suits and let it play. When I get in the zone, nothing around me matters much anyway. I wrote Ashton's Place in about 3 hours of uninterrupted time. It took days, by contrast, to write some of the chapters for The Phantom, because something always seemed to happen to either prevent my concentrating or pull me out of it.

There is Bryce, who almost took over Wayon's Crossing, but I think the character I love the most who has not had his own story told is Karadur (from the same story). His is an interesting back story that I've played around with a little, but not been able to put into words. He was a spoiled, favorite son taken into the priesthood and turned into a killer, who later rose to command not one but two King's Guard and his daughter's Queen's Guard. He helped destroy Azil's family but falls in love with him, fails in conquering the World of Light and decides to live in the twilight, keeping his love secret and protecting a scrawny street kid who turns out to the the bastard prince. I love the crazy twists and turns in his long life and really wish I could come up with a way to tell his story like it deserves to be told.

Well, it was written as something of a joke, and it's not much more than a first draft. I suppose I'd write in more descriptions of actions, as there are long passages with only dialogue. I could wish for Grey Matter's involvement to be less disjointed, or that I'd given Sheila more horror upon having a guy killed right in front of him. I also wanted more of a love story for Nico... But I left out a lot because I didn't need to explain to the target audience at the time, and because I was using someone else's characters and the constraints upon them by their creators. I also loved the idea of a story about two friends, rather than a typical romance. As I explained to Bruce's writer, sure Nico could be attracted to him, but in the "canon" for the series, Bruce was in love with someone else. I may not have liked it, but I wasn't going to mess with it. That just felt wrong.

What can I say? I'm a sucker for a good character-driven story.

Oh, uh, that is I'm not a fan. I've been inteviewed before and was asked this, and this particular genre seems to pop up often just in conversation. I did read Interview with a Vampire a few years ago, but found it quite depressing, though it was an interesting read. I watched the TV show Angel for a season in college, but confess it was really to watch David Boreanez. Other than that? Yeah, not so much a vampire fan. I have no idea what all the craze and hoopla is about. I don't care for the typical werewolf stuff either, although I think that stems mostly from my loathing of insta-love in the romance genre and for whatever reason, werewolf-fiction is chock-full of it.

Glad to hear, Ron! I appreciate the comments.

I prefer to write on paper first, but I have a wrist injury in my dominant hand, so writing becomes painful very quickly, whereas typing I can do for hours at a time with far less discomfort. Typically these days, I jot down quick notes in my notebook, quotes, parts of scenes, that sort of thing, and then flesh it out on he computer. So, I guess I write my drafts on my laptop and the paper is mostly for brainstorming.

I plan to finish The Return, one of the ones on hold. It bugs the ever-living crap out of me that I haven't been able to finish it as it is one of my very favorite stories and Mordred is the brainchild of my best friend. The story is mostly a gift to her, born from something we'd worked on eons ago. I've attacked the story from many different aspects and main characters, and this one works, even if Mordred is a pain in the behind to work with. LOL. I do have scenes written down for the characters and my outline. There's just no words for the on-going exhaustion I've been fighting since coming out here to Chevak and realizing the magnitude of the job facing me. I'll get to it, I swear I will, but the going is slow indeed.

I write when I can squeeze in the time. So much of my day is consumed with writing the non-fiction curriculum for my classes that I don't get too much "fun" time. I work every day, so when I get some down time, I'm usually too exhausted to do more than allow myself to sink into someone else's world for a few minutes. Still, I am at my best when writing when I have a time set aside for it. I used to write on the train and bus during my daily commute, but I haven't been able to have a set schedule since becoming a teacher full-time. My writing has definitely changed. The Phantom was written as little more than amusement for my friends. It's not anything I would consider "serious" writing and I'd say there's a definite difference between it and most of my other writing. The only ones that come close were written for the same group of people: The Toll of the Troll and Butterflies of Death. Sadly, I think I would change some of the things I like the best, like removing some of the text-speak (it's practically obsolete now) and private references. Ultimately, the goal would have to be making it more acceptable to a wider audience. That's probably why I've never gone back and edited it.

@ Cia, so cheerful so early in the day and then to hit me with questions I have to think about? Evil. @K.C. It's okay, I'm here early as well. I'll answer your question first .... Creativity strikes usually when most inconvenient, those times when there's no pad of paper close to hand. I was told once that most creativity occurs when our bodies are focused on some task it's done hundreds of times, allowing our minds to wander. It certainly seems to be true for me. Washing dishes, showering, walking around the community, these are when I get the flashes of inspiration. I have yet to find a suitable method of capturing these moments for creative fiction. Most of the time, the relaxation serves as a tool for regaining my mental focus for school work.

Awesome picture of the site wizard!

I have plans to re-edit the story and add a longer ending, but nothing written right now - work has been keeping me really busy. I'm glad you enjoyed the story! It was originally a series of smaller ones that I re-organized into a more coherent whole for publishing here. The first short story was written for a friend who needed cheering up, but it kind of snow-balled from there and scarily follows my own mood swings during a very turbulent year. When I edited it, I smoothed some of those transitions, but the result, as you mentioned, was something of a roller-coaster. I'm glad to hear that the flow worked for you.

Um, I just realized ... if it's noon in Alaska, it's 1 pm in California, so Pacific TIme is 1 hour earlier .... just saying, if you're confused, please check your time zone cuz I'd hate to miss anyone!

OMG, I can't believe how long ago all this was! Jimminey crickets! And The Phantom? What a silly story!

recently, I tried to watch the movie She. Being a sci-fi fan, the premise of a guy falling for his A.I. intrigued me; however, I failed to note that the film was made by Spike Lee.... Anyone who has seen one of his films knows they're full of cuss words and sex. That aside, the main character was B O R I N G !! He was like a robot as far as his monotone voice and lack of facial expression. I think I managed to survive about 30 minutes of the film (with every other word being f---) and then I just couldn't take the fake (and terrible) attempt at romance any longer. Speaking of robots, I also could not stand the last Will Smith movie, where he stars with his son. You know how Will Smith is so great at connecting with his audience? Imagine I Am Legend, but strip away all voice inflection, emotion, and facial expression. And then there's Jaden Smith, who absolutely cannot act and this movie was a colossal flop. And although most of my friends loved it, I dislike Maleficent. The voice-over was annoying at best and it feels to me like an after-thought, as if the director realized that Angelina Joli wasn't pulling off the whole movie on her own and decided the movie needed some help. She wasn't nearly evil enough, but I blame that on the frustratingly, annoyingly, STUPID "reasoning" they gave for her turning to evil in the first place. That's Disney for you, making women incapable of being powerful characters on their own without a man involved. I could rant about that for awhile -- and then, the ending! Ugh, it was Frozen all over again. Seriously, SO many better ways to have done the "true love" bit. (although, the prince was very cute)

Wow, I've never been in the newsletter like this before! so cool! This story remains one of my favorites, too. I'm so glad you chose it, Renee! I wrote this story before joining GA and while I think it's the first story I posted to the old stories system, it's definitely the one I chose to go first into the new GAstories. To this day, the encounter between Eli and Michael at the gas station still makes me smile.

Thanks for the comments and I'm glad you enjoyed it! This story was written to cheer up a friend of mine, so the angst got moved elsewhere.

Thank you! I hope there was something in here that spoke to you and if not, that you at least enjoyed yourself.

Thanks for sharing all your comments along the way. I'm glad you enjoyed the read.

The "shrinks" that I know are all terrible patients when it comes to themselves, so I had to think how I would handle it if put in that situation. Granted, I'm not a psychologist, but there's some parallels, and I of course have an inkling how Ben's mind works!

I like Grant, did you?

Where there's misery, there's a story waiting to happen, no? Did you find your happy ending?

It was really fun for me to bring up some of Rick's weaknesses, lol.

Now you know how Ben has made his business such a success. and, yeah, I can't help but love those two guys.

Isn't it, though? I have plans to re-write this chapter to make a few things more clear.