Jeez. It's been a bad month. Really, it's actually not even funny how horrible August has been for me. I've had my identity stolen, my health insurance has been a spectacular screwup disaster, and I'm still trying to get used to having a job that has me on my feet 8 hours a day. I like desk jobs. Can I have one of those again? :\
Anyway. I have tomorrow off and I promise to have something up! Maybe I'll see if there's anything I can post in the way of fiction too. Granted, most of what I've written that's not for the book is very much ADULT (....okay, maybe PG13/R for sexual innuendo and possible actions) or snippets from books 2 and 3, but we'll see what I think is still good to post. Most of the adult stuff has been bribes for a friend. As well as the snippets (along with not being able to get that stuff out of my head).
I do have Blogger on my phone, for I might just do a post during my commute (since it's evil and a little over an hour each way). In the mean time, I hope no one has abandoned me for lack of posts. I'm sorry for that and hope that people out there are still checking back here for more stuff.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Spotlight: Ian Dunn
I have my new work schedule but it's pretty much all over the place. So I have Blogger on my phone now, so maybe I'll be making spotlight posts or something that way (because I also have Twitter and Tumblr on there are well...the LiveJournal App just sucks, though). I'll make it work somehow. We'll see.
Anyway, today's spotlight continues the Cabal theme with Ian Dunn.
Name: Ian Dunn
Codename: Cuboid
Power: ability to make anything (people, things) into 3D cubes/abstractions
Team Affiliation: Cabal
So, originally Ian was created as kind of Dean's lackey. I've been writing this story, and characters, since...hellfires. My final project for my playwriting class back in ... 2009. Then in 2010 I wrote almost nothing but these guys for my fiction writing class and then my advanced fiction writing class. And it's really evolved from there. Ian has as well, which is to be expected.
Dean was originally just a hero gone bad, no excuse. He just...didn't feel like being a good guy one day and worked at tormenting Medic endlessly. Ian was there as Dean's liaison, almost, between him and the Cabal. He liked Dean (who was much younger) and liked the destruction that Dean could wreck. He was a very minor character with not a lot going on besides being a lackey and sucking up to Dean and doing glass (which is one of the drugs in the book which I'll explain). As Dean and Medic and the world evolved into what it is now, Ian got redefined and fixed and tweaked as well. I actually have a background and some idea of who he is now.
Ian Dunn was an artist. Specifically, he was an abstract artist. His power had a lot to do with his art and he used it to the best of his abilities. He can turn normal objects into something abstract and then put that into paintings or keep adding things to that abstraction and make it a sculpture. He got himself through college on his ability, but once he graduated he found the world not quite as nice to him as he'd hoped.
He hadn't picked up any sponsors and galleries, while interested, didn't have time/space/etc for him. He'd also picked up a nasty habit of doing glass while in college and it made him angry and bitter and he was eventually found by the Cabal (when he started turning people into abstract images...which killed them, obviously) and was given an outlet (and all the glass he wanted) for that unhappiness. In a way, Ian found his sponsor. So he gets to hang around the Cabal's tower and make art and do glass and just generally be whatever he wants with no pressure from himself or anyone else.
And now to say what "glass" is. This draws back on the creation of my new world, on the nukes hitting and the world heaving and convulsing from the idiocy of humans. While the Alliance from then did absorb as much of the radioactivity and nuclear material as that person could (omg I can't remember who it was who did it if I even ever specified D:) there was still some that fell in some areas. A lot of those areas are gone, or under water, but still. The land is infected. Most of these places already got destroyed so they're not too decent to go to, but people are people. You tell them "don't go there" and they go there. So some people have collected "artifacts" from those places that got hit with nukes and use the particles to create glass. They cut the radioactive dust with hallucinogenic plants that were gifts (hah) from some alien race that came in the early days to try and help out. These guys are not the Elendi. Essentially what glass does is that it let's one's mind cross dimensions and you can live in another world, another life, depending on the time-space continuum. You're just a passenger, really, not in control of what you do or see over there, and no one is really aware of it, but it gives you an escape. Sometimes those worlds aren't very pretty and those alternative lives aren't all they're cracked up to be, but it's an escape if you need one. It's about as close to another world as most people will get since the Alpha Corps refuse to let anyone pass through to other dimensions and times unless there's a damned good reason/have been authorized.
There's another drug, black, but we'll save that one for another time.
Anyway, today's spotlight continues the Cabal theme with Ian Dunn.
Name: Ian Dunn
Codename: Cuboid
Power: ability to make anything (people, things) into 3D cubes/abstractions
Team Affiliation: Cabal
So, originally Ian was created as kind of Dean's lackey. I've been writing this story, and characters, since...hellfires. My final project for my playwriting class back in ... 2009. Then in 2010 I wrote almost nothing but these guys for my fiction writing class and then my advanced fiction writing class. And it's really evolved from there. Ian has as well, which is to be expected.
Dean was originally just a hero gone bad, no excuse. He just...didn't feel like being a good guy one day and worked at tormenting Medic endlessly. Ian was there as Dean's liaison, almost, between him and the Cabal. He liked Dean (who was much younger) and liked the destruction that Dean could wreck. He was a very minor character with not a lot going on besides being a lackey and sucking up to Dean and doing glass (which is one of the drugs in the book which I'll explain). As Dean and Medic and the world evolved into what it is now, Ian got redefined and fixed and tweaked as well. I actually have a background and some idea of who he is now.
He hadn't picked up any sponsors and galleries, while interested, didn't have time/space/etc for him. He'd also picked up a nasty habit of doing glass while in college and it made him angry and bitter and he was eventually found by the Cabal (when he started turning people into abstract images...which killed them, obviously) and was given an outlet (and all the glass he wanted) for that unhappiness. In a way, Ian found his sponsor. So he gets to hang around the Cabal's tower and make art and do glass and just generally be whatever he wants with no pressure from himself or anyone else.
And now to say what "glass" is. This draws back on the creation of my new world, on the nukes hitting and the world heaving and convulsing from the idiocy of humans. While the Alliance from then did absorb as much of the radioactivity and nuclear material as that person could (
There's another drug, black, but we'll save that one for another time.
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Spotlight: Kyle Jeffers
Ohman. This new hires training is kicking my butt. So, at least for next week (August 12) the Spotlight will happen.....sometime over the weekend. And then depending on my schedule at work, Spotlight will be ... tweaked. It's probably not going to be Fridays any more. Because I'll be at work and probably won't have access to a computer (except on lunch breaks, where I plan to eat). So it'll be a little up in the air until I figure this posting thing out again. It might just turn into Saturday Spotlight (but I might be working weekends, so we'll see).
Okay, now we've got the ... yeah. Now we've gotten that out of the way, let's talk about Kyle. Oh, right. I should mention that the month of August is for baddies. Specifically, the Cabal.
Name: Kyle Jeffers
Codename: Psion
Power: telekinetic, powerful enough to level a city
Team Affiliation: Cabal
Kyle is the leader of the Cabal, bisexual, and very talented. He's jacked into all sorts of networks to find out what's really going on in the world and, as such, knows how the world could be if the balance was upset. What am I talking about? Glad you asked.
The world of the Black King, in 2035, is a utopia, of sorts. What do I mean by that? Well, a utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. But, really, that doesn't work so much, does it? There's always someone who slips through the cracks. While my world seems like a utopia, and that is the leading reason why so many people from other worlds and dimensions would like to take up residence on the main world (I am so seriously tempted to start calling this Earth-Prime or Earth-0 or something and then number the rest of the earths like the comic book industry has. Oof.) and why the Alpha Corps have such a busy job, it's not actually an exact utopia. For the purposes of this world, utopia is defined as a society/world that has perfect balance where no one rocks the boat too much. People prosper, there is food and resources for all, everyone more or less is content with their lot and life and do not harm one another, etc. There are still drugs (2 specifically -> glass & black) and there are still people who make their living by hooking and the alternative ways of making a living.
The difference is is that everyone knows their place. If they step out of it or rock the boat too much in the....seedier aspects of life, the Cabal will come down on them. Where there is light, there must be dark. The Alliance protects the world and the Cabal controls the rest. The Squad works on controlling any "outbreaks" that occur from the Cabal slipping (ie - the drugs pop up and start heavily addicting and killing people). Any bigger schemes, like the Cabal wanting to take over and entire floating city (air or ocean) for their own purposes, or anything along those lines has --- you know what? Here, have Kyle explaining it to Dean:
He's a telekinetic, and a very powerful one at that. He's young, especially for being the head of the Cabal, but people respect him because of his power and the fact that he's been able to make the Cabal prosper very nicely in his few years of being in charge because he can see the wiggle room in the balance so well. He has no problem killing people who threaten that balance, which is why the Cabal really doesn't have much change in the organization. It's pretty steady because of that wiggle room. And everyone knows that if they oust Kyle that the prosperity and relative freedom they have will go right down the toilet.
Kyle is also bisexual, which works against him (a little bit) when dealing with Dean. He's got spikey red hair and black eyes, is 6 feet, 5 inches, and enjoys the finer things in life. The Cabal has a lovely tower
where they live in England. The inside is done up in the Regency style. 
Think Jane Austen, I suppose. There's a lot of Grecian and Roman influence in the rooms themselves, some of the gilt with gold and utterly over the top, but very comfortable. Kyle really likes the finer things in life, and he shares that with the Cabal. He's ambitious, but knows better than to let them get the better of himself. He refuses to use computers to conduct business, knowing better than to provide anyone with an easy way to find them. He usually works with paper (actually tree pulp, not the plastic-y digital paper that everyone else uses) and is as low-tech as he can get. In the age of technopaths (those who can communicate with technology as easily as talking with people) it's the smart "businessman" who makes sure no one can nail him on anything specific. That's not to say they don't have computers in the Tower, because they do, but the Cabal never conducts business on computers that they use frequently. Kyle believes this is mostly common sense, but we all know how common common sense is, right?
Kyle's fate after book one is ... difficult to determine. As you can see from the quotes, Dean and Kyle interact. This happens during a specific, crucial moment in book 1. Honestly, I'm not sure what happens after a certain point. Which is fun. However, I'm kind of fond of Kyle. He's Dean's ace-in-the-hole, somewhat. In addition to all that, well, ...okay, I actually can't tell you any of that. Rats.
I think I'll end it there before I inadvertently spoil something in the books. :)
Okay, now we've got the ... yeah. Now we've gotten that out of the way, let's talk about Kyle. Oh, right. I should mention that the month of August is for baddies. Specifically, the Cabal.
Name: Kyle Jeffers
Codename: Psion
Power: telekinetic, powerful enough to level a city
Team Affiliation: Cabal
Kyle is the leader of the Cabal, bisexual, and very talented. He's jacked into all sorts of networks to find out what's really going on in the world and, as such, knows how the world could be if the balance was upset. What am I talking about? Glad you asked.
The world of the Black King, in 2035, is a utopia, of sorts. What do I mean by that? Well, a utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. But, really, that doesn't work so much, does it? There's always someone who slips through the cracks. While my world seems like a utopia, and that is the leading reason why so many people from other worlds and dimensions would like to take up residence on the main world (I am so seriously tempted to start calling this Earth-Prime or Earth-0 or something and then number the rest of the earths like the comic book industry has. Oof.) and why the Alpha Corps have such a busy job, it's not actually an exact utopia. For the purposes of this world, utopia is defined as a society/world that has perfect balance where no one rocks the boat too much. People prosper, there is food and resources for all, everyone more or less is content with their lot and life and do not harm one another, etc. There are still drugs (2 specifically -> glass & black) and there are still people who make their living by hooking and the alternative ways of making a living.
The difference is is that everyone knows their place. If they step out of it or rock the boat too much in the....seedier aspects of life, the Cabal will come down on them. Where there is light, there must be dark. The Alliance protects the world and the Cabal controls the rest. The Squad works on controlling any "outbreaks" that occur from the Cabal slipping (ie - the drugs pop up and start heavily addicting and killing people). Any bigger schemes, like the Cabal wanting to take over and entire floating city (air or ocean) for their own purposes, or anything along those lines has --- you know what? Here, have Kyle explaining it to Dean:
“The Cabal and the Alliance will always be locked in an endless waltz,” Kyle said. “We do what we want, trying to overthrow them and take over the world to remake it in our image, but we will never succeed. For one, we'd miss the fights with the Alliance too much. It's fun to pit ourselves against them.”And then Dean's thoughts:
“And the second reason?” Dean asked, trying to calm his anger.
“Mostly it simply comes down to balance. You cannot have good without evil."
"Then again, that term summed up the Cabal itself. Showy. They were all for show. They wanted to undermine the Alliance, to have a little wiggle room in this seemingly perfect world, but they would not actively destroy the status quo they had achieved for themselves. They had wealth, comfort, and the assurance that they'd be left alone so long as they did nothing to upset the balance."ANYWAY. Getting back to Kyle...
He's a telekinetic, and a very powerful one at that. He's young, especially for being the head of the Cabal, but people respect him because of his power and the fact that he's been able to make the Cabal prosper very nicely in his few years of being in charge because he can see the wiggle room in the balance so well. He has no problem killing people who threaten that balance, which is why the Cabal really doesn't have much change in the organization. It's pretty steady because of that wiggle room. And everyone knows that if they oust Kyle that the prosperity and relative freedom they have will go right down the toilet.
Kyle is also bisexual, which works against him (a little bit) when dealing with Dean. He's got spikey red hair and black eyes, is 6 feet, 5 inches, and enjoys the finer things in life. The Cabal has a lovely tower
Kyle's fate after book one is ... difficult to determine. As you can see from the quotes, Dean and Kyle interact. This happens during a specific, crucial moment in book 1. Honestly, I'm not sure what happens after a certain point. Which is fun. However, I'm kind of fond of Kyle. He's Dean's ace-in-the-hole, somewhat. In addition to all that, well, ...okay, I actually can't tell you any of that. Rats.
I think I'll end it there before I inadvertently spoil something in the books. :)
Monday, August 1, 2011
Whoa...
So I was bored and killing time while I plotted out the second book of my (hopeful) trilogy (as in I hope it doesn't turn into a quartet) and poked the stats page.
I had 121 views in July.
I think I'm tearing up a little. Seriously. :) Thank you! Hopefully you all continue to like what I write and post about.
I will say that this month, August, is going to be a little hectic because I'm starting a new job (YAY! \o/) and trying to write as much as possible (while still doing my last freaking class for my degree). I might not be able to post a lot of fiction, but I will keep up with information and spotlights!
Stick with me and you can't go wrong! Or, well. You won't lack for weekly entertainment. If you guys have any questions or requests, want to see something (or someone), let me know. I know I'm being pretty tightlipped on a couple of things, but I'm doing that for a reason (so you'll all buy the book whenever it gets published. WHEN, not if. WHEN! :D). But I'll be happy to share whatever else I can! :D
I had 121 views in July.
I think I'm tearing up a little. Seriously. :) Thank you! Hopefully you all continue to like what I write and post about.
I will say that this month, August, is going to be a little hectic because I'm starting a new job (YAY! \o/) and trying to write as much as possible (while still doing my last freaking class for my degree). I might not be able to post a lot of fiction, but I will keep up with information and spotlights!
Stick with me and you can't go wrong! Or, well. You won't lack for weekly entertainment. If you guys have any questions or requests, want to see something (or someone), let me know. I know I'm being pretty tightlipped on a couple of things, but I'm doing that for a reason (so you'll all buy the book whenever it gets published. WHEN, not if. WHEN! :D). But I'll be happy to share whatever else I can! :D
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