Spirits of the Hunt

After being assaulted by the ceremony and meeting Seer of the End I continued to have it intrude on my thoughts. They were telling me that I had missed something. An almost shapeless and formless vision of a deer spirit entering the circle and some ritualistic hunt was missing from the story. Furthermore, they had things to say, a few names were incorrect, and I realised that they would have at least two different words for blood: the blood of life and death would be different than that which could be brought out by violence from an arm. Human blood of such type would be different to that which was carried by animals and sometimes drunk. So maybe even three words.

Right now, I only have the two. One based on proto-Indo-European, as discussed last time, and the other on Old English. I have chosen to render this not as Blot or Blod but as blwd - because I do like the Celtic 'w' sound.

Anyway, that's what seized me today. Analysis as always provided by 750words.com because I like the idea that one can learn more things through statistics.

Rating: PG-13 (violence and sexual-content) - I mean, I guess so.

Feeling mostly upset, and concerned mostly about death - okay, actually, maybe it is.

Mindset: Extrovert - Negative - Certain - Feeling

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Sight (ack); Us and Them: Us

32 minutes at 40 words per minute

High in the Mountains

Moon Dancer came to visit me this time, and had some things to say I don't think I consciously saw coming. But, honestly, it makes sense if you read the previous sections where I wrote of the coming of age and even the NSFW scene. Shadow of the Stag returned too, but he was much older and more tired than I remembered him. He's got some stories to tell, Moon Dancer's, I feel, are still to come. Perhaps Seer of the End has something to pass on to help that along, perhaps not. There was a moment in writing her coming of age sequence where I thought that maybe Moon Dancer or the Medicine Man would play a role. They still might, but they did not belong in that moment.

I seem to be gripped by an ideas sleet at the moment, and the time to indulge it, so I am not complaining nor standing in the way of it.

Analysis once again provided by the reliable 750words.com

Rating: PG (sexual-content[? I don't see this at all])

Feeling mostly self-expressive, and concerned mostly about religion - huh, I guess so!

Mindset: Introvert - Positive - Uncertain - Thinking

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: Them

26 minutes at 43 words per minute

Seeing the End

Oh, well, here I am again. It's been a while. Today I was assaulted by my Prehistoric setting. You may recall, you may not, it was many years ago now, that I was unconvinced by the naming of the women characters in my story. Moon Dancer and Shadow of the Stag made sense to me, their names and the reasons for their names came easily. The coming of age for Moon Dancer natural and flowing as though it arrived in a dream and, very probably, it did. But the rest? The tribe were not real to me despite my best efforts, I brought them forth with effort as though passing something uncomfortable. I wanted to do right, I could manage the NSFW section - that came fully-formed one evening - but the important parts? No.

One of the aspects of this, it's always been there, is dissatisfaction with using English for the setting - it doesn't feel right. I am doing my best to restrict vocabulary, to carry that Prehistoric feeling and not diminish meaning, rather to force the reader to see the connections between things that the society I write about does in their language. I also very deliberately looked into Urdu for some of the words: mother, sister. Proto-Indo-European for blood. Variations for aunties (something missing in my first run through of attempting this side of things here).

Over the last few days I found myself dwelling on the coming of age for girls, the point at which everything shifts in perspective and the biology of that. And I thought about how our society forces fear and shame into proceedings, how that is reinforced in so many areas of the Patriarchy and also on the research that shows that the first calendars were created by and for women. The primacy of that power, for power it is, and the fear it evokes in the men. What if men were not in charge as they are not in my Prehistoric setting and, instead, a community of women devised ways of coming to terms with things?

My desire to turn this into more than a setting, to conjure forth a plot, remains however and so the scene is bent to the will of the direction. One thing is clear though, I have a better naming system, one that feels much more natural and realistic. One in which the fear of the Patriarchy may have sprung from, for men can destroy but only women can dabble in the forces of creation and death as easily as preparing food or hunting prey or gathering shelter.

Analysis once again provided by 750words.com that, if you haven't already, you should sign up for.

Rating: PG-13 (violence and sexual-content[?])

Feeling mostly upset, and concerned mostly about death - well, I'd quibble that, but I can see how it comes from the text, see what you think.

Mindset: Extrovert - Negative - Certain - Thinking

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: You - interesting!

46 minutes at 40 words per minute

Fire, wisdom and Bechdel

I confess that this entry was a hard one. It has been quite a while since I wrote anything at all, so it was always going to be odd coming back to it. Nevertheless, I return to my prehistoric story and find that I am writing something that I never planned. I wanted to write about music in the mountains and communities of itinerant men on journeys sharing skills and ideas but, instead, I found myself writing about tribes and women in nests.

Before anyone gets going, it's not about women being home-makers. At least, I hope not. It is centred on a meal though, because in my experience anything worth anything is centred on food. If I write about anything without food then that is when I am at my least realistic. It was partly inspired by reading some posts and blogs about women in history and how they tend to get ignored. How our perceptions of the modern era seem to inform what we consider to be realistic and authentic in SF and Fantasy novels.

I was also struck by Bechdel and that thing about women who talk together and don't talk about men. I have failed in that regard because the child of the piece makes reference to the male of the story in her petulance. This vaguely upsets me. However, I have, apparently, found a way around the female nomenclature - we have Falcon and Leaf on the Breeze as names. I dunno, they kinda work but I'm still not completely satisfied, they don't break the mould as much as I would like given my Moon Dancer and Shadow of the Stag names that came out of nowhere and instantly seemed to fit.

So, to the analysis provided by 750words.com as usual:


Rating: PG (violence[?])

Feeling mostlyself-expressive, and concerned mostly about food and drink - figures, given the setting

Mindset: Extrovert - Positive - Uncertain - Thinking

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: Them

34 minutes at 43 words per minute

So NSFW it's untrue

I recommend that you don't read this at all if you are in a place that would track your internet usage. I haven't written for a while, work stuff, and I wanted to get back into the swing of things. I also wanted to get back to St Avril and, obviously, that didn't happen. Since when do I write what I actually set out to write? Instead I ended up thinking of the Prehistoric setting and trying again to get into the head of my female protagonist. I think I have Moon Dancer now and I think I know how he works and what I would like to do with his part of the story, at least insofar as I understand what the story is.

No, with the females I am less convinced. So... I wrote my very first sex scene. Well, no, not quite. I wrote one at the age of 16, when on exchange in Germany, and as angsty teen it was was unrealistic and ended in a murder. The woman kills the man, just because. I never did work out why, it was brutal and angsty and... well, I was a teen. Anyway, it turns out to be really difficult to write feelings in sex in actual words. I did my best.

Rating: R (sexual content, violence[?] and swearing[?]) The first I get, the rest I don't.

Feeling mostly upset(?) in a dead heat with happy, and concerned mostly about religion

Mindset: Extrovert - Positive - Uncertain - Thinking

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: Them

37 minutes at 44 words per minute

First Draft: An Attack

I was feeling a bit dry tonight for my nightly attempt to write. So, I started up some Shamen and East 17 (yes, so sue me) and tried to write what came to me. The strange wolf-suited people came back and... well, let's just say that this is probably my worst writing yet on this project. I think I have a handle on the relationship between my female protagonist and her companion better now, but trying to avoid cliche and the modern trappings of gender roles was... more difficult than I thought.

Really struggling with names too. I don't want 'feminine' names per se but I also want to stress the differences in roles within the group. We know that my males have a coming of age where they choose a new name, what about females? I suspect that 'first blood' would be the coming of age... I think I need to write one of those and see what happens actually...

It's been relatively easy to write a more sensitive male character - I just go through ideals - but writing female characters that have agency in the midst of an attack is hard without making the female characters fit tropes for male characters. The little I've read of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has warned me off that as a means of writing 'real' females. Equally, in avoiding fighting and showing awe and fear at the command of fire in this scene, it seemed as though I was writing women that needed saving - which was not the point.

Why is this so hard?

Analysis courtesy of 750words.com - who probably deserve a bit of money from me by now...

Rating: PG - violence (check)

Feeling mostly upset, with anxious following, and concerned mostly about relationships

Mindset: Introvert - Negative - Uncertain - Thinking
I think if the last one had been Feeling I would have nailed this

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Hearing; Us and Them: Them

29 minutes at 37 words per minute.

Secrets that men keep

Tonight I fill in a section. I realised today that Moon Dancer doesn't eat or drink on his quest for about four days. Okay, that's fine, I guess, but there's no way he can't drink in that time. He'd be mad with thirst, something I haven't even mentioned. Okay, the lack of hunger is fine, I guess, but the lack of thirst? Unforgivable!

So, tonight I thought to simply edit that section a little and then move onto new stuff. Instead we have an additional discussion in which I learned more about how males operate in this society I am creating. Also, a little about how the sexes are viewed by men, I hope that came out right. Anyway, another conversation that I hope retains enough of the poetry of previous entries to stand with them.

Analysis from 750words.com as always:

Rating: PG (sexual content) - not sure where that is. I guess one of them is naked?

Feeling mostly self expressive and concerned mostly with religion

Mindset: Introvert - Positive - Uncertain - Thinking (very male?)

Time: the Future; Primary Sense: Sight (damn); Us and Them: You

22 minutes at 36 words per minute

Shadow of the Stag

So, apparently I am attacked once again by the Prehistoric thing. And tonight I was shown how a boy becomes a man. I was also shown a little bit of the nomenclature that I had been so missing. Up until tonight I had no concept of the naming of people. I now have some knowledge of naming and how it is going to go, some idea of how the society works and, apparently, two ways in which the males of this setting can be aligned. It follows on from this post.

There is a poetry in this section, I hope, certainly I felt it as I wrote. I was writing mainly to the tune of Victoria Lucas by Moby, and that may show through too. For at work today I had a moment alone with no one else around and I danced in a way that I haven't for a good few years. It felt good to dance. It felt good and probably looked terrible. But it felt good. That may have influenced what I wrote tonight.

Analysis, as ever, from 750words.com who are brilliant. If sometimes a little strange in their analysis.

Rating: PG-13 for swearing, sexual content and violence (I'm going to go ahead and say here that I see none of that in what I wrote).

Feeling mostly self expressive (with upset as a side-order) and concerned mostly with religion (with leisure as a side order)

Mindset: Extrovert - Positive - Certain - Thinking

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Hearing; Us and Them: You (with a side order of them)

36 minutes at 43 words per minute.

Giving Birth

This is probably the closest I can ever come to articulating birth in a way that actually makes any sense and draws on the experience of a home birth with the Boy. It is not perfect, one of the greatest issues I had with this little exercise was just how much of birth is communicated through sound effects and feelings that have no words. It really showed the limitations of modern English in describing such an experience. Sadly I lack the knowledge to know if this is different in other linguistic traditions or if older languages were better at it, but it did bring home the problems that I am going to have with a Prehistoric setting.

Namely, the idea that I am trying to put across here is a society that is very alien to our own. There are aspects of that society that I confess I feel are superior to our own and there are aspects that I feel are not. I want it to be a balanced experience for the reader. It is not a preachy thing that I wish to create but something sufficiently different that it becomes curious.

In many ways it has commonalities with the work that I did creating Socialist Britain for Regarding Bakunin in that I want to present a generally positive alternative without it being so uselessly utopian that it can be dismissed. I want to create a realistic world where I am not blinded by my own bias and prejudices but, instead, am free to explore those differences and those positives that I feel are there in a way that other people can make their own mind up. I am fully prepared, for example, in good science fiction to take a positive and paint it negative or vice versa - as it should be - and I want readers to feel the same way with my work. I should not be telling them what to think, merely providing the scenes and the story so that they can decide for themselves.

Analysis courtesy of 750words.com - if you are a writer and not using this site then what are you doing?

Rating: PG-13 for sexual content (maybe) and violence (no, really not seeing this)

Feeling mostly happy (a first) and concerned mostly with eating and drinking (ah ha ha)

Mindset: Extrovert - Positive (75%+) - Certain - Feeling (50%+)

Time: Past (60%) and future (30%); Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: Them

36 minutes at 33 words per minute.

I still have no idea how I'm going to name these people or what to do with the dialogue. You'll see what I mean if you read on!

Prehistoric: Stalked

Another night another dream but always this. He is stalked. Still no names, still no plot.

Analysis:

Feeling mostly affectionate and concerned mostly with eating and drinking

Mindset: Introvert - Negative - Uncertain - Thinking

Time: The Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: Them

29 minutes at 54 words per minute

Prehistoric: Coming of Age

It appears as though this particular vein is continuing. Tonight I write a scene in which something actually happens. My main character is coming of age.

No, I don't know how it relates to the previous two sections yet, only that I need to know how this all works. It's not finished, he's just about to start his quest but I don't want to force it. The style of this work and the way it's moving are completely, I think, different to my normal style. They may even be different to what I did for NaNo.

Anyway, again the analysis (thank you 750words.com):

Rating: PG-13 (sexual content and swearing[!]) - really not sure where there is swearing.

Feeling mostly affectionate and concerned mostly with religion

Mindset: Extrovert - Positive - Certain - Thinking

Time Orientation: the Past (with a dash of the future)
Primary Sense: Touch
Us and Them: Them (well, it is third person)

42 minutes (37 actually typing) at 38 words per minute

Prehistoric stuff part 2

I still don't have a title for any of this, much less an idea where it is going. I think that someone has to die and then we have a murder mystery style plot going on, but I really have no idea. Also, I don't really want him to be the main character if I can help it. Him going off and doing a murder mystery plot would be... well, a bit patriarchal, no?

Again some stats for you, courtesy of 750words.com:

Rating: PG-13 - sexual content and violence (still not seeing the violence)

Feeling mostly affectionate and concerned mostly about religion (but only just)

Mindset: Extrovert - Positive - Certain - Feeling

Time: Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and them: Them

Prehistoric Detective Novel?

I have long toyed with the idea of setting a story in Prehistory, but I am no Jean Auel and I have never even read the series. Equally, my knowledge of Prehistory is small and slim. That doesn't diminish my urge to do it, just make it harder as I lack the time to research and the inclination to really go for it. As I haven't touched my NaNo project since February (and then didn't really do much of use having left it since December) I figured I'd try something that had nothing attached to it.

What follows, then, is a quick exercise to try and get going. Before I share it I shall place the analysis (courtesy of 750words.com, where you should also be going) and then a line break so that it doesn't clutter up the blog any.

Rating: PG-13 for sexual content and violence (not sure about violence)

Feeling mostly affectionate and concerned mostly about religion

Mindset: Extrovert (75%) - Positive - Certain - Thinking

Time Orientation: the Past; Primary Sense: Touch; Us and Them: Them

Time: 28 minutes at 46 words per minute

Conspiracy?

Idea sleet ahoy!

Ages ago I had the idea for a detective-esque story set in Prehistory.  Oetzi, the ice mummy discovered in the Alps, seems to have been killed by a blow to the back of his head with a blunt object.  Otherwise he was alone.  It would appear that we are dealing with a murder.  Some form of murder mystery in such a time is therefore not totally improbable given the enormous level of societal sophistication we can find evidence for.  However, I have steered away from indulging it because of the immense amounts of research such a thing would require.

I mean, I would first have to read the Clan of the Cave Bear series by Jean Auel before even knowing where to look to find the sort of things I would need to actually write anything of merit.  Then there's the issues of language, of pan-European movement and climate to consider.  It gets complicated fast.

I have been doing quite a good job of avoiding thinking about it as a viable idea in the run up to this year's madness.  Then Radio 4, yes I am officially that old now, decided to do a number on me.  There was this show on whilst I was waiting in the supermarket carpark and there was someone on talking about the possibility that homo-sapiens and Neanderthal Man may well have interbred and inter-mingled as separate species.  They came from a common ancestor and were cut off by an elongated glacial period when some got trapped in Europe and some got trapped in Africa.  This meant that the original homo sapiens would almost certainly have been black whilst the Neanderthals would have been stockier, stronger, whiter and likely red-haired and green-eyed according to the studies done on their genome.  It would appear as though red-hair in homo sapiens was brought, perhaps, by interbreeding with Neanderthals, though studies have been entirely inconclusive - not even correllation!

It would therefore be fascinating to write about that period and to postulate on the interaction between two such different species as they met.  The lady on the show did a fine job of setting up a scene whereby they would spy members of the opposite species for the first time, separated by a couple of thousand years of development and having similar size brains and capacity for speech the difference would not have been insurmountable.  Furthermore, given the relatively short separation in evolutionary terms, they would have been able to interbreed and may even have shared linguistic roots!

Exciting.  But not possible for NaNo?