More Coincidental Weirdness

I just did a search on Google for "Coma City" and found a band by that exact name, claiming to be "the hardest punk-ass motherfuckers in the world!".

They classify their music as Heavy Porn Music. Could be worth a listen ;-)

Now I'm wondering whether I should change the name of my book. I'm not exactly happy with it anyway... It's more than just a city that's in a coma, it's the entire human population of the planet. Maybe Coma World would suit better... or something else entirely.

I've still got 2/3rds of the book to go so I'm probably jumping the gun worrying about the title... and then there's the simple fact that I DON'T EVEN HAVE A PUBLISHING DEAL!!!

Great minds think alike... that or I'm psychic

Listening to: The Day the World Went Away, Nine Inch Nails

I've found another book on Lulu with a similar concept to the one I'm writing now. This seriously worries me because I would hate to finally have my book published and have it written off as a stolen plot... but then again any publicity is good publicity, just ask Dan Brown :-)

This is not the first time I have had this problem. The first book I started (currenty in limbo) involves an incident involving the International Space Station which almost puts NASA out of business. I had written about a 1/4 of the book when a cargo ship crashed into the MIR Space Station, followed by a fire. Then a few years later, when I was just revisiting the book, NASA's Columbia Shuttle disintergrated on re-entry. I was beginning to wonder if I was psychic.

In The Pocket and the Pendant by Mark Jeffrey (released 2004) time on Earth stands still except for a boy named Max and a few other children who set about to find the cause of the time freeze and rectify it.
In my Coma City, the population of Earth is sent into a deep sleep, with the exception of a small group of survivors who set about locating the mysterious force that has inacted the world's slumber.

Further details from Wikipedia (entered unbeknownst to the author) reveal further likenesses:

• The event occurs at a particular instant, affecting the entire world simultaneously.
• Aliens feature in the story (except in Coma, not everyone believes Aliens are responsible)
  

The big difference is that Mr Jeffery's book is aimed at the teen audience and mine is more for the 18+ audience - there's a ranchy scene and a bit of colourful language... and that's just the first chapter :-)

Also, The Pocket and the Pendant is the first book in a series (the second book: The Two Travelers is due for release soon). I have no current plans for a sequel to Coma City, but who knows what the future may bring - lottery, or car crash, or join a cult (gratuitous Bjork quote from Possibly Maybe).

Mark Jeffery could very well be the next J.K. Rowling. I wish him all the best with it.

I, on the other hand, am hoping Coma City has more of a Neal Stephenson-Snow Crash-like status. Not a household name but popular with those in the know.

At it again

Listening to: Oompa Radar, Goldfrapp

Just finished chapter 9.

I've created my own conspiracy theory and debunked it all in one chapter. Gotta love that.

Word count is 11600

Since I'm over the 10k word mark I thought I'd change the colour of the Progressometer to green.

Little by Little

Listening to: Blade Runner Soundtrack, Vangelis

In the last couple of days I have twice broken my golden rule:

"Until thou hath penned thy last chapter, thou shalt not edit previous work. Thou shalt only add new writings."

I've added a new paragraph to the very start of the book, which I believe adds a little something that was previously missing... mainly a hook to get the reader to continue reading.

I've also rejigged the chase-scene chapters. Something I've been meaning to do for a while.

Oh well, it was more of a guideline than a rule.

Word count is: 10982

Inspired Effort

Listening to: Utopia, Goldfrapp

Finally, after an almost two month hiatis, I have added to my book.

All it took was some inspiration, which came in the form of a novel called The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect by Roger Williams, whose on-line novel I discovered via the self-publishing site www.lulu.com

Roger's novel, although far more profound than my own, gave me a real boost. As did the Lulu site, which I will seriously investigate when I get to that stage. For now I will concentrate on writing whilst I have my new found inspiration.

I had been thinking of trashing Chapter 7 and a new character it introduced. But now I have found a way to keep that character and the scenario Chapter 7 provided. This has also opened up possibilites for some drama and a tie-in to the finale. In fact, without giving away too much, the new character could become the crux to the conclusion of the story.

Word count is 10498.

Chernobyl, 20 years on.

Listening to: Complex, Gary Numan

BBC News | In pictures | Chernobyl's silent graveyards |


These pictures from Chernobyl, 20 years after the reactor exploded are kind of fascinating, although very grim. The image of half sunk ships left to rust in the icy port is like a scene from a Sci-fi movie. It gives me some ideas for my book - which I must get back to ASAP.

Burning the Midnight Oil

Listening to: Rock the Shack, New Order

Another late night with excellent progress. The chase scenario I mentioned in the previous post has really got the juices flowing.

This scene was actually the genesis to the whole story of the Coma City idea, so I'm glad I've finally been able to get it down.

Word count is 9890!. If I wasn't so tired I'd get those extra 110+ words out to make into the five-figures. But I'm having enough trouble typing this so I'll come back to it later.

Good night

Picking up the pace

Listening to: Strict Machine, Goldfrapp

I was up until 1:30am last night writing an action packed chapter involving our hero (still haven't named him) on a supercharged scooter (like the one in the photo) being pursued at 180Km/h along a freeway.

It was a lot of fun to write, I hope others will find it as much fun to read.

The scooter is a Gilera Nexus 500, a very sexy beast indeed.

I actually envisage this chapter appearing a bit further into the story but the idea was there so I had to get it down. I also needed a distraction from the trouble I'm having with finishing off chapter 7 without it seeming like a waste of words... but maybe ditching it is the way to go.

The word count is now 8477. A long way from 50,000 I know. But it's a moving goal post.

Authors Blogs

Listening to: Tuna Fish, Emiliana Torrini

I'm now listed on Authors Blogs. The listing is alphabetical, by first name, so you will need to scroll all the way down to the S's to find me (Steve Scott).

P.S. Can you spot the typo in the description. Call yourself a writer? HA!

Copyright

Listening to: Lovely Head, Goldfrapp

You may have noticed that I have placed a copyright notice on this blog.

This is mainly to protect any postings I make regarding my book(s); such as the post of Chapter 3 I made earlier.

I have also added the same notice to the footer of the novel.

If you would like to know more about copyrights under Australian law check out this site: Australian National University (ANU) Division of Information - E-Prints

Not a bad effort

I'm quite proud of myself tonight. I've just written up Chapter 7 in about 2.5 hours.
Now I have the Progressometer as a gauge I found I kept myself going that bit longer. I've gone from 6700 words to 7395. 695 words is nothing to sneeze at.

I only wish I had started earlier tonight rather than at 11pm. It's Sunday now but I'm sure my 2 year old won't allow me to sleep in past 7am.

I've changed the target to 50,000 words. 60,000 seems too much now. I'm not even sure if 50k is over the top for this story but I'll leave it for now... besides I really should get to bed.

Also, you might notice that there was no "Listening to:" at the top of this post. I was so busy writing I didn't even notice the silence. Yay!

Progressometer

Listening to: Giving myself away, Faithless

I just added The Zokutou Word Meter to the sidebar (Over there on the right, below the 'About Me' box. Yeah, that blue bar thingy).

Hopefully this will encourage me to write more often; thereby pushing the blue bar on a steady march to the right.

I've set the expected total word count to 60,000 - I think that's achievable, I reckon I'm over a 10th of the way there (I can always change it as I get nearer THE END).

So keep an eye on that little blue bar. I know I will be.

The Pareto Principle.

Listening to: Supersonic, Jamiroquai

The following extract from Victoria Lynn Schmidt's blog, Characters Journey makes a lot of sense to me. But does make me wonder if this blog is attributing to the 20% or the 80%.

Note: Victoria calls it the Pareter Principle but it's actually the Pareto Principle named after the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who in 1906 observed that 80% of property in Italy was owned by just 20% of the Italian population. It was later generalised and given the more catchier name of The 80-20 rule.

Characters Journey: "Ever heard of the Pareter Principle? It explains how successful results come from 20% of your hard work and the other 80% is just wasted effort. In business this is a well known principle and has been proven true time and time again. As writers I think we can all relate to this principle whether it's wasting time on chores that don't really need to get done or wasting 80% on starting numerous writing projects without getting any of them completed. Boy if we could just foucs on that 20% all the time how wonderful that would be!

The question is - 'How do you know what the 20% is that will get you results without having to waste the other 80% to get there?'

Calm your mind. Pure and simple. When you are calm you develop 20/20 vision and can see which actions will give you that 20%.You can calm your mind before you decide what needs to be done in a day, or which projects to work on, with meditation, deep breathing, soft music or any number of calming activities you enjoy. In one sense Julia Cameron's daily pages serves to accomplish this task, I know many of you love to write daily pages and swear by them.

Just a thought. Being more productive with your time will help you get those projects completed."

A sample of the current book.

Listening to: Butterflies and Hurricanes, Muse

Our hero has awoken in his bed after a big party. He's hung-over and feeling like luke-warm crap. But that's the least of his problems when he discovers that his girlfriend and all the other party-goers are in some kind of coma.
As the day progresses things go from bad to disastrous, with some moments of weirdness in between, as he learns that it's not just his friends who are comatosed... It's the whole world!

Coma City
Chapter 3
Tinfoil Hat

Its dark outside and I still have that headache. You know those nagging little buggers where just one small area of your brain just doesn’t feel right? Well this one is just above my right eye.
I grab a couple of headache tablets from the kitchen drawer and swallow them down with some juice whilst I take a look out the window.
Streetlights are on but there are only a very small number of lights on inside houses and still no moving traffic. A dog wanders under a light on the other side of the road, sniffs the post, pees then trundles off into the shadows. There’s no noise, except a cat meowing to be let in somewhere.
The rest of the flat is just the same as it was. My friends are all lying about asleep.
I gather up some blankets and drape them over them. I huddle a few who lie on the lounge room floor close together and use a couple of big blankets to cover them.
In the kitchen Mikey still has his face resting on the table and Jules is still laid out on the floor. I decide to try to get them into bed so I pick up Jules first, because she’s the lightest, and carry her off to Mikey’s room, laying her gently down on the bed. Then go back to the kitchen and kind of carry/drag Mikey to his room and lay him on the bed. I remove their shoes and pull the covers over them.
I tidy the kitchen up and find myself placing the bottles quietly into a big green garbage bag. Realising this I decide that if I woke someone up it’d be a good thing so I start dropping the bottles in, letting them break and bounce off each other.
No one woke.
After an hour or so I get the kitchen into a reasonable state and take the garbage downstairs to the bins.
It's so eerily quiet out here it gives me the spooks so I drop the stuff in the bins and scurry back inside.
There’s still nothing on the TV or radio. So it’s back to the trusty Internet.
The traffic-cams of the world still show no flowing traffic. Other web cams yield similar results; some show people laid out on the ground. The weirdest scene is at a theme park where a roller coaster is zipping around its track with a cargo of sleeping passengers.
There’s still no clue as to what made everyone fall asleep, which gives me no clue as to why I’m not asleep.
I search on the words: “entire population asleep”, surprisingly I get quite a few responses but only one has a direct match.
I click on the link, a page entitled “The Aliens will assume control while you sleep” loads up. Scanning the index I find items with titles such as “How the aliens will make the entire population go to sleep”, “Make your own Delta Wave Interference Cap” and “I know the aliens secret”.
Obviously this is the web page of a complete nutter.
Nevertheless, out of sheer curiosity I click on the link titled “How the aliens will make the entire population go to sleep”.
Apparently the Aliens will use special radio frequencies that he calls D-Waves, which will force our bodies into a deep sleep by simulating the low frequency delta waves that are normally generated by our brains when we’re in the deepest stage of sleep. The delta waves slow our breathing and heart-rate.
“With the entire population asleep the aliens will simply just move right in with absolutely zero resistance” the author claims.
The author, who goes by the name I-Kno and is clearly insane, doesn’t say why the aliens would put everyone to sleep rather than exterminate us all. Maybe they’ll hook us all up and use the electricity in our bodies to power their new colony like in the The Matrix movies.
The “Make your own Delta Wave Interference Cap” is a hilarious read. I-Kno has invented the Delta Wave Interference Cap or DWIC for short, and explains in great detail how to wrap aluminium foil around your skull.
Yep. Plain old, everyday cooking foil. The Delta Wave Interference Cap is the classic Tin-foil hat and supposedly blocks the Aliens sleep waves that force the brain to sleep. I-Kno wears his 24 hours a day and strongly recommends you should as well.
He even has photos of himself wearing the tin-foil hat. And guess what. He looks like a complete nutter!
There’s a section where you can leave comments. I can’t resist so I write, “The aliens are here! You’re a genius; your Delta Wave Interference Cap has saved me. Thanks so much.” For added laughs I sign off as ET – being the squat little extra-terrestrial from the movie E.T.
“Loser” I chuckle as I click on the SEND button.
I continue searching for answers but there’s nothing but the brilliant Mr I-Kno’s explanation for the situation. A very scary thought indeed. Imagine if that loon is right?
Of course he can’t be. I don’t have a Delta Wave Interference Cap and I’m awake. I wonder if I-Kno is awake.
I end up reading through the various syndicates I subscribe to and come across an article from last Tuesday about a University professor in America who has developed an Artificial Intelligence program on a huge bank of Sony Playstation gaming consoles. This program has become so clever that it won’t allow its maker to shut it down. The professor finds it absolutely fascinating that the program has learnt how to protect itself.
“Good god man! Haven’t you seen The Terminator movies?” I yell at the screen.
This guy is almost as scary as I-Kno. Maybe they’re related.
I’ve seen enough so I close down the computer.
Feeling tired again so I go to bed.
Shelley hasn’t moved a millimetre.

Other things I've started and would like to finish

Listening to: 2+2=5, Radiohead

I'm such a scatter-brain. Not only do I have ideas for three books banging around in my head I have other projects I've begun that are yet to be completed.

Here's the Top 3 Projects I'd Like to Get Finished in the Next Month or Two

1. Edit the video of my two kids and burn it to DVD. The eldest has just turned two, the youngest is three months.
I bought an Apple Mac last year with the intention of using it's creative powers (and greater stability) for creative pursuits such as these. From what I've been able to do so far the Mac is brilliant - and that's just using iMovie which came free with computer.

2. Fix up my father in-laws website. He has a furniture shop and an existing website that needs a bit of a spruce up. I offered to do it for him rather than pay a web developer (sorry to all the web developers out there who have all just let out a collective moan of 'Not another noob who thinks he can make a website').

3. Learn the JAVA programming language. I'm a COBOL programmer (and not that much of a noob) and fear I will be put out to pasture if I don't learn some new tricks soon.

So you see, I have set myself a few goals... the question is can I pull them all off and still find time to write my book. We'll have to wait and see.

Why write a blog when I should be writing my book?

Listening to: The man who told everything, Doves

I'm glad I asked that completely rhetorical question.

The simple reason is guilt.

By thinking about what to write here I will feel guilty for not actually writing my book. Therefore, so my thinking goes, the less I write here the more I should be writing in my book. This theory falls flat on its arse for many reasons; writers-block for one - but I'm sticking with it.

Also, I hope it will get the creative juices flowing, so maybe after writing a post here I can go back to my book and apply those juices to its pages.

In the beginning...

Listening to: Baggy Trousers, Madness

Why is it that so many of my school reports informed my parents that I was easily distracted?

I wouldn't say I had A.D.D. It was more likely that I was just easily bored.

The problem still persists to this day (I should be doing other things than writing this). For example; a few months ago I had a great idea for a novel, I wrote up the first 5 chapters in a week, the sixth chapter took another couple of weeks and now all I do is go back over what I've written and tinker with it. I have the story right through to the end in my head but I can't seem to commit myself to continuing.

This isn't the first time I had ideas for a novel. In fact it's the third... and I never finished the other two.

Have I not got what it takes to be an author or is there more to it?

Steve