Long time, no post!

Today's post will be a bit of a ramble as I try to get back into the swing of blogging. (Okay, well, I never was exactly very consistent with this...) It's kind of like my mind is an old-fashioned, messy garden with a bunch of random thoughts that look like rabbits hiding everywhere. They're shy and hard to catch, and they keep breeding.

One thing I would like to start doing is going for a walk midmorning when I hit the wall and start having trouble sitting still. For reasons I will not describe yet in this post, that is not as easy as it sounds. The park is only a block away, so it by all rights should be easy, yet it is not.

Books about monsters are really attractive to me. I can't get enough of books like Lamplighter and Veiled Rose. If there are monsters in it, I usually like it, sometimes even if it's a little cheesy. Unless it's poorly written. I have trouble turning my internal editor off these days.

I've been struggling to get writing done lately because I really need a quiet environment. Where I am stuck right now it is often so noisy I can barely hear myself think, let alone distill some of those thoughts out into story. There aren't noise-canceling headphones good enough to fix it either. I NEED TO FINISH DIFFERENT SKY. *bangs head on desk*

New favorite thing to listen to

...when writing:

Rainy Mood

Assuming, of course, that it isn't actually raining, rendering the website unnecessary! :)

Inspiration: Christmas Faery Tale

Artist: angel1592

It's a little late, but I'm working on a short story using this picture for a prompt. I'd add a word counter, but I don't have any way currently in the program I'm using to keep track of word count.

"Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse." They must be using a glamour, then, so no one notices them.

Inspiration: Favorite Poems

I have not read very much poetry, though I know I should. There's so much of it I don't know what to try. I've memorized several of Tolkien's poems, and those are the only ones I've spent much time with, so I can't say I know much about poetry.

I love this poem, though. It seems to overflow with radiance and romance.

"She Walks In Beauty" -- Lord Byron

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express,
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

I want to write a story about it. I know it's probably already influenced things that I've written without me noticing.

What's your favorite poem?

Playing With Ideas: When Zombies Attack

So this is what happens when I play music videos before I go to bed.



(It's a very silly video, but the music is cool. This wasn't the only song I listened to, but it was the only one with zombies.)

I dream about zombies. Some people's zombie dreams are nightmares. Mine aren't. I think I probably have failed to understand the concept of zombies somewhere or something. I actually wrote the dream down because I thought it was such an interesting idea. It really doesn't follow the way zombie movies go at all, or so I understand, because I haven't watched any (except for one, an old black-and-white movie).

What I wrote is too long to post here, but the most interesting part to me is the idea of half-zombies. I can hear you getting squicked out (me too), so I'll quickly explain. The half-zombies are zombies that somehow managed to retain some of their humanity when they were turned. They're not mindless, and they know who and what they are, because their memories stay with them. Some of them even like it, because they think it makes them better fighters, which is important in a world where everything has been destroyed and most of the inhabitants have been turned into monsters. However, some of them. . . don't. In the dream, I was turned, so I was one of these.

Here's an excerpt from what I wrote (sorry for how rough it is):

I flee and barricade myself in a bathroom, desperate to figure out what to do. I was the leader, but I am a zombie now. Is there even anyone left to take my place? Are the others dead? I look at my face in the cracked mirror and stare at my withered hands. What if the half-zombie state isn't permanent, and I lose the rest of my humanity? It would be like dying.

Okay, so this could easily be a nightmare. There's a definite potential for horror. But for whatever reason, my dreaming mind decided to include magic as the way to fight zombies instead of guns or weapons. Magic is pretty integral to the whole idea, because in the dream, only humans can use it. Half-zombies may be strong, but for some reason that I'm having trouble defining in words, they can't use magic well at all. Full humanity is required.

I'm not clear on how the zombies were created, but since this is a magical world rather than a science-fiction one, let's say they were created by some form of curse. If that's the case, then there should be some way to break it, which is what happens next in the dream (again, sorry about the bad writing):

Something taps on the window. I look up and see a face blurred by the glass. Terrified, I hide in the shower. The latch pops, the window opens, and someone leaps down through the small opening.

It's one of my friends. I run to meet him, then stop and press myself against the wall, realizing that contact with me will turn him, too. But he strides forward, and before I can stop him, he embraces me and kisses my cheek. The touch turns me back into a human. He explains that the last of the people from the cursed city went into hiding to escape, and they discovered a spell that is the antidote. Now we must fight our way out to bring the cure to the rest of the world.

Whether this spell could restore the fully mindless zombies. . . though I really like the idea, I don't think it would. It would only fix the ones that still have some of their humanity left. The idea is a little awkward, I know. Still, it's interesting enough that I would go ahead and start turning it into a story if I wasn't already working on two other ones. Maybe I'll come back to it someday.

Do you ever dream things that make you want to tell a story?

More writing music

On the fear of making mistakes.

Fear of the blank page is not something I've experienced often. A blank screen, paper, or notebook always made me excited to fill it up with words, describing something fun, scary, amazing. I saved my fear for reading aloud.

I used to read with my brother every night, and every time we started a new book, it was so hard for me to get my voice going. I'd stare at the page, read the words over and over, with him complaining and urging me to just start already. And I'd try, and choke on the words, until I could bludgeon away the shyness and reach the part of my mind that really loved the story, that really wanted to say those words in that character's voice, the part of me that probably would have wanted to be an actress if some of the other parts were just a bit different.

If anyone else walked into the room, I'd inevitably stop, sometimes in the middle of a sentence, garnering suspicion that the book we were reading was bad. That wasn't why I stopped. It never was.

I haven't had the chance to read aloud for years. But now my comfortable relationship with blank pages is tenuous, and they're like those first pages of a new book. I stare at them with my fingers resting on the keyboard nubs, or my pencil on the paper, and my thoughts stick in my mind like tangled spiderwebs. Sometimes, music or tea, or a burst of anger or enthusiasm, unwinds some of them. But at the worst of times, my mind goes dark and I stay silent.

It's stupid to worry about what other people will think of what you're saying and let those thoughts shut you up, and I know it. But it's really hard, sometimes.

Why so dark?

I don't see any reason why steampunk and urban fantasy HAVE to be creepy or dark. There has to be more room for creativity than that. If it's icky and miserable, with no glimpse of goodness, it's not something I will enjoy reading. Or writing, for that matter.

All my stories tend to be rather dark at times, but the darkness isn't the point; it's only dark until the light bursts in and shatters the darkness with its radiance.

To live in a story -- from apricotpie

Sometimes I think about the world in my stories and wonder who and what I would be if I could enter that world and live there with all my characters. What would my life be like there? Would I be a Selkie, living in the sea and visiting human lands in search of new adventures? Would I be an Elenali, flying amid the tall trees and weaving clever enchantments? Maybe I would be a human, living in the mountains or the forest, or maybe even the lost Isle of Tânynis.

Just because I created that world, doesn't mean I would be a queen there. Maybe I would be a ranger, or a servant, or a shepherd. No matter what, I would still be a princess.

What kind of adventures would I have if I were a naien like Nyéranta? What if I were a phoenix, or even a dragon?

If I could go there, I would want to see and do and taste everything, every place, every moment of history. First I would visit the Mistwood Forest, with its ferns and vast trees, and then I would go to the Snollë Mountains, to Saranor, to the icy land of the Northlin, and below the sea to the ancient city of Cetacea.

Sometimes I think I wouldn't need to go there, because I've already seen it in my dreams.

Naien, part one of chapter one

The evening was grey and misty. Melenyáriel the naien trotted swiftly through the trees, her thick, tortoiseshell fur fluffed against the cold. This was the coldest winter she had yet seen. Light snow was falling, collecting in a thin layer on the mossy ground and melting in minute drops on her fur. She stopped for a moment, tilting back her head to peer at the sky where it showed between the trees, and spotted a bird, its wings dark against the fading light. It might have been one of the Elenalië, but there was no way of telling.

Melenyáriel sighed and padded on, more slowly. She had missed the Council, and had met no one to speak with all day before it. She wished she hadn't fallen asleep in her den. By the time she had woken and made it to the Afoncircle everyone had gone. The circle of boulders was strange and eerie when no one was there. Melenyáriel shivered and cast another quick look at the deepening sky. Snow clouds were not so uncommon this close to the mountains, but Melenyáriel was already uneasy and these seemed ominous, somehow.

The snow was getting heavier. Melenyáriel shook the bothersome unmelted flakes off her fur and carried on faster. It would certainly be too cold to sleep in her pool tonight. Her hidden bed beneath the bushes would be comfortable, and warmer and safer than the water, where she might be trapped in ice. She could catch a fish from the pool and eat it peacefully. Her mouth watered at the thought. Maybe Nyéranta would come to see why she had missed the council. If not, perhaps she might go to see her.

Her spirits lifting, Melenyáriel broke into a run, and soon came to her home. The waterfall was flowing unhampered by ice, but the edges of the pool gleamed faintly with a leaf-thin layer of it, and the rocks all about were coated with ice from the spray. White, powdery snow hid the shapes of the pine bushes under which she slept. The space underneath, as always, was free of ice, and the moss was pleasantly damp. She pushed through the narrow entry and lay down to rest, curling her tail around her nose. She would wait until morning to fish. The sun had set; the clouds were dull and purplish grey, what she could glimpse of them through the dark branches of the bushes and trees. She sighed softly and closed her eyes.

"Melenyáriel! Come, wake up!" Nyéranta sounded grumpy, as usual.

Melenyáriel yawned and stretched out. Immediately she wished she hadn't, as a shower of snow fell on her. She gave a meow of disgust and stood up. "You can come in here if you like."

"No, I won't. I'd only drag in a bunch of snow."

"What?" Melenyáriel looked around more closely. Her nest was under the snow; at least a foot of it had fallen overnight. "This is amazing!" she cried in delight. "It's like that story you told me when I was a kitten, about the winter when you were born that was so cold all the Naienel gathered together in one nest to keep warm." She pushed out through the snowbank, and was surprised to find it easy to move through. She looked at Nyéranta, her eyes shining. "I never thought I would really get to see something like it."

Nyéranta's golden eyes were troubled; the wise old cat showed no sign of sharing Melenyáriel's enthusiasm. Alarmed, Melenyáriel tried to push her way out on top of the snow, only to sink again up to her ears. She proceeded to dig away enough snow to make a place for herself to stand, and waited expectantly for Nyéranta to tell what was on her mind.

Nyéranta didn't say anything, only shook herself as if to clear her thoughts away. Then she flipped her tail warmly at Melenyáriel. "You missed the Council meeting last night, young one."

What had she been thinking about? wondered Melenyáriel. She nodded to Nyéranta. "I fell asleep in my den waiting for the snow to stop."

"Airan was looking for you." Nyéranta's eyes glinted mischeivously. Apparently she had decided not to think whatever it was about the weather that had been worrying her; that was what it had to be, Melenyáriel decided. After all the winter she had told of had been a frightfully dangerous one; cold was something all the Naienel took very seriously. If the streams froze too thick it would be impossible to fish, and many cats would starve. Melenyáriel nodded to herself; then suddenly realized that Nyéranta had mentioned Airan.

"Well?" Nyéranta gave her tail an amused swish.

Nyéranta had always teased Melenyáriel about her absentmindedness, but she thought this remark especially rude. She lifted her left paw and began washing it, mumbling something with her tongue caught in its thick, spotted fur, by way of answering.

Thump. Melenyáriel stopped cleaning her paw and looked up. "What was that?"

Whump. "What on earth -- " started Nyéranta, twisting her neck to look around, her teasing of Melenyáriel forgotten.

Just at that moment a large clump of snow fell out of the canopy above them and landed in a shower of white flakes smack on top of Nyéranta. The old naien gave a cry of annoyance. "I should have known." She stood up and shook the snow out of her pelt. "Do you now see what a bother this rubbish is?" she complained.

Melenyáriel bounced with mirth, her eyes sparkling with laughter. Nyéranta sighed and shook her head, though even she seemed slightly amused.

Crandon and Mora Ironwood

There's a town in Northern Wisconsin called Crandon (like one of my characters) -- in Forest County. Nearby? (Well, relatively near.) Ironwood, Michigan, and Mora, Minnesota. Rather shocking. Imagine, once we've moved there, if I try to tell anyone about my stories, they'll want to know if I named the characters after the towns. I didn't! I'd never even been to Wisconsin when I gave them those names. Admittedly, though, Mora is the name of a camping area in Olympic National Park. That is on purpose. Her (and Crandon's) other name, Ironwood, is really from the incredibly gnarly trees that grow in Eastern Oregon. Crandon I just liked the sound of.

It's true, though, that I find inspiration for the names I choose from place names a lot of the time. Even more so, plants, especially the scientific names because they sound so interesting. Trientael (the name of my story's world) is like that. The plant it's from looks like this.

More conventionally, I've found ideas in myths, and here and there picked names to give homage to someone else's story. Ellidir, the town where Mora's grandmother was born, I named on purpose after Ellidyr from the Chronicles of Prydain, for reasons that I'm not going to tell you. ;) Actually, notice that I'm not really telling the specific reasons I chose any of those names. ;D