BAD ASS-IGNMENT !

I need your help.  I need your feedback.

Help me build

Yes, I've revised chapters One through (now) Four and Chapter seven...again.  I split chapter one in two...right in two!

Chapter One- Nyk
Shall We?
Chapter Two- The Urwald
Where are you going?
Chapter Three- The Foculus
Will you shine?
Chapter Four- Noctvyls
What are you afraid of?
Chapter Seven- SCATHE
What are you hiding?

I'm still not sure whether to make Chapter Seven a Prologue.  Your Bad Ass-ignment (there is no choice) is to read Chapter One and Seven and tell me which one should go first.  Shut up and do it now!  Pretty please with Arca Trochia and Dae-mit on top.  If you do, I'll let you read the first four chapters PLUS chapter Seven for free!

Now don't bother me until you've decided.  I'm testing a book.

What comes first; the Nyk-en or the SCATHE.

CONTROL PSYCHO

What?  Why can't people to act and think in manner that suits me?  Why can't everything in my life go the way I planned?  Shut up? 

Never!

So, there are many reasons to be thankful and appreciative for the existence of Halteres.  Yes, it's some Bad Ass Sci Fi.  Yes, it's the culmination of most of the dumb (I mean awesome) ideas I've had my entire life (the rest of my dumb/awesome ideas will be expressed in my next novel: OPPOSABLE).  But super yes, it allows me to be the control psycho I was always meant to be.  It's a vent; a channel.  It's my big, fat, Bad Ass baby!  Believe me, you need this as much as I.

Have I mentioned myself enough in this post yet?  Shh.  Get your own blog.

I think I've put a little of myself in many of Halteres' characters; Nyk, of course, because I'm the Nexus; Drolos, because I'm a wanna be neurotic megalomaniac; Thysia, because I'm looking for a balance between judgement and justice; and even Brims, because I'm sexy as F!  But I guess the character I most need to relate to is the Kynoi.

The Kynoi; an Atosentient (intelligent on an atomic level), bio-ethereal (organic + psionic) entity of immense power seeking to satiate its cosmic super-ego.  We all know the pursuit of perfection is inherently imperfect.  In life, in evolution, in Halteres; this quest if rife with compromise and tribulation.  That's me (except I am but a man).

By the way, you know when I tell you to shut up and don't bother me, I'm just farkin' witcha?

Now shut up, and don't bother me.  I'm manipulating a book.

DON’T TAKE THAT TONE WITH ME!

So, sometimes I take things that are mentioned to me and internally construct vehicles of thought that steamroll perception into malleable mulch.  I received many comments from my three and a half faithful followers (If you think you’re the half, you probably are.  Step it up!) about how much they enjoy reading my blog posts.  Thank you!  I love writing these posts.  It’s my outlet; my therapy, and I believe it makes me a better writer.

Now the steamroller.  I know there’s a disconnect between the tone I take in these posts and the one that is evident in Halteres.  Here, I am free.  In Halteres, I feel suppressed by the omniscient third person narrative of science fiction/fantasy.  I’ve lost my voice!

(Whispering now)

It’s alright…alright?  I don’t have to start over, but I gotta get my voice into Halteres.  I thunk about doing the narrative in the first person from the Kynoi’s point of view, since it’s basically the omniscient Atosentient presence in the novel, but that seems like a fustercluck.  No.  I can still work with the current POV; liven it up with interjectications of my heroic humoric sense.

Calm down.  I know when to stop.  Maybe that’s the problem.  I know when to stop, and I usually stop well short.  Just like I always show up to shtuff early.  Maybe I need to start showing up late and not giving a marsopod’s vas deferens about it. 

They say, ‘Write what you know.’  Shut up.  I know a lot of boring crap that nobody wants to read.  I say, ‘Write how you are.’  I’m an a-hole.  I’m a judgmental pecker-butt.  I’m a control psycho (we’ll get to that later).  And I’m not at all sarcastic.  Wait, I’m pretty sure people don’t want to hear that voice for 460-odd pages.  Temper yourself, my child.  There is good in you.  Thanks, Connie (that’s what I just started calling my conscience).  Now…shut up.

You get the point (please be getting the point).  Sorry to be going off on these parenthetic (not pathetic) jackknifed hobo-cars of thought.  I gotta go.  Catch you on the flippity- flop.

Until next time, don’t bother me, I’m toning up my book.

 

BAD OPTIONS AND ASS ACTIONS

A primary element of good literature is characters being faced with choices; difficult, story altering choices.  The decisions they make drive the plot and create tension throughout the story.

Nyk's initial choice is whether to stay home, amidst personal persecution, community crisis, and familial danger, or follow the Kynoi and discover the mysteries of Halteres and his providence.  Admittedly, his bio-ethereal shepherd is making a lot of these calls, but this fateful decision, and what follows, sets forth the series of events that encompass the rest of the novel.

My characters exist in extraordinary circumstances, but there should always be a relatable correlation to the reader; a connection that spills into reality.  I learned this from my years in education.  Students, like readers, will be more likely to maintain interest in the material being presented to them if they can form personal connections to it.

Halteres is very personal to me, but what about you?  I believe I've had similar experiences, emotions, and choices to other humans.  So how do I convey that in Halteres?  Can you relate?  That's all that really matters.

Regardless how alien the subject matter, there must be a strong element of humanity.  I believe there is here.  I've explored very relevant themes; alienation, comradery, spirituality, and the privilege and responsibility of choice just to name a few.

The characters must face each choice, situation, even mundane dormancy, with the mindset that they contain within them a cache of righteous decisions and actions.  Can you relate?

This shouldn't be easy for them.  That's boring.  Blue or red pill?  Go back for Newt?  Join the creepy old guy in the desert?  I face analogous conundrums every...single...day.  Now I must choose; continue this post, or go to sleep.

Good night.  Don't bother me.  I'm choosing...what shirt to wear to bed...



Now get that book finished!

AD BASS ACKWARDS BENGINEERING

Call it splintered intuition.  Call it doubt.  I created Halteres from a nebula of inspiration.  Now the interstellar debris from its gravitational collapse threatens to alter the course of this most cherished of planets.

Do I let Halteres drift into the void of resignation?  No.  Do I allow Halteres to be consumed by the supernova of ignorance?  Hell..NO!  Halteres exists.  It is alive.  It is awake.  It speaks.

Halteres is ever evolving and, as is taught in this discipline, its is not a journey towards perfection, but relentless dominance.  I must persevere; continue to engineer a world that captures the will and overwhelms the senses.

I don't have to start over, but many of Halteres' components need to be calibrated.  I have rewritten chapter one at least six times.  I'm currently rewriting the S.C.A.T.H.E. chapter.  Every time I blog about a character, setting, device, entity, or theme, I go back and verify its consistency in the novel. 

The blueprint is there.  It always has been; in my DNA.  Sometimes, however, the code needs to be changed.  And believe me, with every revision Halteres becomes more BAD ASS!

I'll have the new SC.A.T.H.E. chapter up soon.  Until then, don't bother me.  I'm reverse engineering a book.

JUST IN THE TIME OF NYK

Alright, faithful followers.  The new, New, NEw, NEW chapter one is uploaded for viewing!  Take a look and let me know what you think.  I feel like I'm going through more beginnings than the LOTR has endings!

Also, check out all my recent posts.  They're absolutely brilliant!  I'm blindeded by them!

I'll keep it short because I know you have much catching up to do.

Go.  Read.  Love.  Hate.  React.

And until you're done, don't bother me, because...

on to the next chapters!

HALTERES' BIG BAD ASS? LORD DROLOS

Every good story needs at least one big baddy.  Lord Drolos; the Sovereign Leader of Halteres Minor, Olys, and the Mendax is one of mine (his name used to be Archon, but I changed it because Archon has been used about a million point lots of times.  Lord Drolos is also a working title, but it's one I feel much more comfortable calling my own.)

Anyway, 'Lord Drolos' is the self appointed leader of the OAs (Original Architects); rulers of Halteres Minor; Olys, its emergent capital city; and the Mendax sub-species.  Wait, did I mention some of that already?  Shut up.

Is Drolos powerful?  Well if he isn't, he hides it well.  He hides a great many things.  Most of all, he hides his true strength (or lack thereof).  If fear begets control and control begets power, then Drolos is powerful.  However, if true power is inherent, or endowed through action, then he is not.  There are insecurities, addictions, and debts that sabotage the quest to fulfill his potential.  Let me explain.

 Drolos is not powerful:

• He is ultimately reliant upon other entities, beings, and technology to see any of his plans come to fruition.
• He is not personally connected to the Kynoi, but needs it to escape the planet.
• He needs Phyquae to complete construction of the S.C.A.T.H.E.
• He needs Nyk to activate the S.C.A.T.H.E. and bring forth the Kynoi.
• He has no true friends or allies...and that really bothers him.
• He needs a golden carapace body brace to overcome gravity and assume his superior stature among his subjects.
• At his core, Drolos is nothing but a petulant sociopath.

Drolos is powerful:

• He controls the other OAs through promises of delivery to Vathoul, a hidden sanctuary, and ultimate escape from the dying planet.
• He controls the Mendax population through fear of Relegation to the Akros wasteland and ultimate 'exile' to the Fate Plateau.  These systems of population control are fully operational battle station.  Oops.  Anyway, they've been in place awhile.
• He has a clandestine working arrangement with Smin and the Arkos Mercs as insurance to stay in power.
• He controls the secrets that could destroy all Halteres.  Ah, ah, ah!  I'm not telling!
• Drolos is an unstable, petulant sociopath.

Regardless, if Drolos is feared but not powerful, he seeks alliance with an entity that IS powerful but not feared.  The Atosentient Lord.  Something that should be feared.  The Kynoi.

So, you mix a little of this

With a dash of that

And a sprinkle of the following

 And you might have something resembling Lord Drolos. 

Anyway, I gotta go...Oh yeah; don't bother me, I'm amalgamating a book.