Thinking of ...

... writing stuff again.

This is something I've been thinking about for a while, I reckon there's a book or two in me somewhere trying to sneak out. Trouble is, it's daunting thinking of all the setting up that a book would need before you can crack on with telling the story. The best books are consistent with themselves and stay faithful to all the little things. Rules get set up that govern the world, if those rules get broken then the readers can quite rightly call you a fraud.

Pacing is critical as well, I'm picking that up from watching Stargate Universe. I'm still curious about this new series, although it seems very badly afflicted by StarTrek Syndrome. That's an episode pacing style that has the cast fumbling to fix a problem, only to miraculously sort it at the end. SG Universe is similar, episodes tend to be slow-slow-slow until 5-10 minutes from the end when the pace goes ultra fast. And their problems get sorted out just in the nick of time. That pacing style seems rather jarring.

I've two options really for what I'd write in terms of the fictional setting. It would either be a Dungeons & Dragons style fantasy swords, sandals and magic world or it would be science fiction with starships. Worlds of magic are pretty easy, there's a blank slate and the Rules that govern the world can be far simpler. You just make them up because you can ignore the laws of physics if you want to. Or bend them with that magic stuff :-) Just have to be careful not to plagiarise someone else's world.

Science fiction on the other hand ... That's much tougher. This is where "being consistent with itself" bites really hard. You see it mainly with series that have grown and grown, with the backstory taking on a life of its own. David Weber's Honor Harrington series is very good but is starting to suffer from "where do we go from here ?" On the other hand, Larry Niven's Known Space books have a very strong theme running through because the Rules of that universe, while being quite tight, give a huge amount of scope allowing the stories to be about the characters.

Star Trek tied itself in hellish knots because of all the "Hey ! That looks cool, we'll use it in an episode". Plot devices that aren't properly thought out come back to bite you later. There's a quote in ST The Next Generation where the computer says "NCC 1701 D, the fifth Starfleet ship to bear the name Enterprise." Which was fine when that episode was written but got broken with the series Star Trek Enterprise. Star Trek also suffers immensely from the demon of Time Travel, allowing this to happen in a series (unless incredibly carefully planned) opens up all sorts of cans of worms. Curiously, the fella who wrote this alternate non-Federation ST timeline avoids time travel completely. That's a good read too, when you get around some of his phrasing :-)

So - I'd like to start writing scifi but I'm a bit daunted by the amount of setting up that would be needed before getting down to the fun stuff of storytelling.

Things like :

Mechs or tanks ? (noone argues with a 100tonne Big Robot)
What type of guns ? (projectile or energy)
How much attention do you pay to physics ? (Star Trek and Star Wars are extremely badly behaved with respect to physics)
Military or civilian characters ? (Star Trek vs Firefly)
Socio-political situation (religion, wars, customs)

Choices made there define the whole world and the rules within which the stories must play out. "New technology" as a plot device can only go so far in changing or bending those rules. Stargate is a decent example of how new technology can change the rules but it has to make sense or the audience is lost.

Hey ! That's enough about theory of writing fiction, why's this come out again ?

There's a few reasons, like reading some of the stories that come through the Eve alliance's newsletter. I play sci-fi style games that have great stories, with Mass Effect being a great example. I also get scenes sparking through my head as well, there's one running that involves a new spaceship in the yard having techs do inspections on it. Now there's a scene where an author could lead a reader into how the ships are put together. Interesting for a techie, not likely to be much story there though.

Stuff I do with work occasionally kicks off ideas that, as is normal with me, lead off into tangents so lateral they've turned longitudinal.

For the fantasy world, I had the starting few chapters of a novel lined up which I reckon would have grabbed people. A fantasy setting is best with a party of characters to have fun with and the Monday night gaming gives plenty of ideas there. Question is though, how to carry it on. Novel's gotta have a plot.

Riiight - that's enough Wall of Text about writing a Wall of Text :-) Time to get back to listening to stuff while wondering if my blocking sinuses (and resulting slight sore head) will let me play that Internet Space Ship game :-)