Setting: a resolution

So, after sleeping on it, I think I now have the problem of setting solved.  Once I'd done that, my main character gave me his name.  Turns out he'd been rather petulant about it because I should have known that the story would not be set in Central Europe at all.

I think it best if I explain it roughly how he explained it to me.  It couldn't be a novel set in Europe, historical or otherwise, because I was essentially writing about the rise of a dictator.  If I wrote about one rising now then the novel would swiftly become out of date and hackneyed; if I wrote in the past I would automatically be creating an alternative history with all of the attendant problems that this would create and potential glaring inaccuracies.  If I set it in the future I would run the similar risk of becoming dated by messing up predictions.  It had, therefore, to be set in an analogous setting, like Europe but not Europe.  Attendant to that I had to avoid Germanifying the whole setting - if I created a Germany and a dictator in it then I would be reinforcing everything that I do not believe about the rise of the NSDAP being peculiarly German.

As it is a mainly character-driven piece I could not really make it too moral a tale either - there would have to be an acceptance that some of what my main character was doing not only made sense but may actually be good ideas, and I can't tell the audience which are good ideas and which are downright evil - that means not focussing on the Jews, you see, and that would require an analogous Europe to play properly.

So, there you go.

His name is William.  He lives in Merkavia.  It turns out the analogous setting was one that I have been inadvertantly creating for some years and didn't notice was a full-blown and working place!

I should also point out that I have been messing with technology level.  We have steam trains and stevedores and top-hatted industrialists but also motor cars, telephones and tannoy.  By the end of the story we'll be dealing with computers, internet, mobile phones and social mobility.  It's all a bit mixed up.  No velcro though because of no rocketry to the moon, which means no ICBMs, but we'll have jets.  Yeah, I know, anaologous settings: the lazy way to plot novels!

Now, on to tonight's writing!

Cities, ethnicities and names

So, despite hitting a pretty respectable 8,149 words I still don't have my MC's name, which makes naming other thing svery difficult.  I mean, what if he's German or Greek or Irish?  Can't have an Irish person going to Munchen nor a Greek man attending a hospital in Dublin.

In the meantime I fleshed out my MC's life, and it is a horrible thing in general, poor dear.  Still, being autistic and a future evil dictator I suppose he deserves it on some level, for the evil, not the autism.  I'd post some of it, but now I must retire to see to the Boy, who is a little unsettled of late, bless him.

First paragraph...

Well, having pushed out 3,504 words so far I thought I would post my first scene as it stands.  I have no names though, no names, and only codes to go with.  FF = Father Figure; MC = Main Character; MF = Mother Figure.  My main character refuses point blank to give me his name and so I have no clue what nationality to make the other names.  Bit worried about what this says about me as a person, this scene, but it's NaNo, so I guess that sort of happens.

Scene 1

It was unnatural, the silence that followed the screaming of seconds before, and FF was certain that it was not a good sign.  Pacing, such a good idea before, now seemed out of place and over anxious, like he was trespassing in his own domain.  His hands clasped behind his back strained for some other action, which is why he kept them clamped there with a tremendous force of will.  Unusually he could feel his moustache tickling his top lip and his nostrils.  He wanted to sneeze.  He wanted it all to be over.

       The balding man before him coughed again, slightly and with some tremor. “We… ah…”

       Snapping his eyes to meet those of the small man, FF frowned.  “Yes?”

       “A decision, sir, we need a decision.”

       The silence lingered.  It wasn’t natural.  It wasn’t right.  “A decision.”

       “Well, more- that is- we need your decision.”

       “Quite right,” FF puffed his chest out to emphasise his point, “Quite right.  Very well.  Yes.”

       “Sir?”

       “I consent.  Pull the bastard out.”

       “Yes sir.”  The little balding man scurried away, almost ratlike FF reflected, and then closed the door.  There was a little commotion from beyond that door, sounds like people talking quietly.  A groan escaped FF’s wife.

       When the screaming resumed it was loud, lusty and long.  But, reflected FF, at least it was right.  Pacing resumed for a short while, and then his hands stopped straining, the screaming continued as he turned on his heel, took a seat and pulled out his hip flask.  A swift slug of whiskey warmed his insides, the fire of Dutch courage as his father would have said, God rest his soul, and FF felt more like himself.  He inspected the artwork on the walls, some of it the traditional style and some of it the more modern stuff coming out of Spain and Italy.  He didn’t really know what to make of it all – lines and splotches and colours intermingling.  All a lot of rot, of course, the true masters of the art were all gone now.  No one seemed to have time to study the classics properly and no one seemed to have learned anything from the history books.  He harrumphed and sat back more heavily in the chair to wait.

       Presently the screaming stopped.  FF stood, dusted himself down from any dirt, imaginary or otherwise, and walked briskly to the door.  There was a new sound, mewling and pathetic, and that announced the entry into the world of the little bastard who must now meet his father.  He hoped that everyone would be decent.  Door thrust open with a little more force than was strictly necessary, FF entered the room.  Ignoring the woman on the bed whom fate had made his wife, her legs strapped down to the iron frame to allow better access and covered with the aftermath of delivery by forceps, and nodding to the surgeon with his paper mask FF turned to face the two nurses hastily wrapping the mewling bundle.

       “Is that it?”

       One of the nurses made to curtsey, but stopped when she realised no one else was doing so.  Out in the provinces old habits died hard and FF felt a flash of recognition at the gesture.  The old ways were dying out.  “Yes, sir, it’s a boy.”

       “Hmm.”  It came out as an admonishment.  “I know.  Is it healthy?”

       “Yes, sir.”

       “Good.”  Squinting he could almost see a face in amongst the bundle and blood.  “Shouldn’t it be louder than that?”  He waved irritably at the first nurse to open her mouth.  “Never mind, the bastard will do, I suppose.”  As if noticing the woman on the bed for the first time he started a little.  “Clean her up and get her decent, she’ll be home by the evening,” then to the woman herself, “I think we’ll have steak tonight.  I shall be back in the evening.”  His hands went back to their old position above his rear.  “Doctor, thank you, it must have been a difficult one.  I hope the bastard didn’t give you too much trouble, sir.”

       “No more than one would expect,” the Doctor answered with a tired smile.

       FF clapped him on the shoulder, once, then walked to the door.  “I think this calls for a little celebration.”  And then he was gone.

       “Can- Can I hold him?” whimpered the woman on the bed, her legs were still immobile, her face still drawn from the pain and a sheen of sweat still glistened from the travails.  “I want- I want to hold him.”

       “No, dearie, you just rest yourself,” replied a nurse in a businesslike fashion, “Doctor here’s got to stitch up that nasty tear before you’ll be up to moving much.  We’ll see the boy is well looked after, don’t you worry yourself.  Get you home and rested in no time.”  She fluffed a pillow and thrust it under the woman’s head brusquely, but not unkindly.  “Steak’ll help you feel right soon enough.”  A thin smile of comfort.

 

            “His name…” gasped the woman, almost sleeping from the strain now, “His name is MC.”

Nano is go!

And we're off as of the end of this post.  My challenge is to hit 2k words this evening.  I'm not entirely certain that will be achieved.  So many of you lovelies are already on higher totals than that.

Well, you give me something to live up to.  Onward and upward!

Decision made

Okay, I am go with the evil dictator who is autistic plot.

Potential start point I stole from Placebo's A Song to say Goodbye video.  It may help ground the whole thing.  It may end up being the whole thing.  I may be insane.

Wish me luck you lovelies and I'll see you on the morning when we are so up for typing 'til our fingertips are raw and bleeding.  Only, y'know, in a less icky way than that.

NaNo Planning

So many avenues!

In the Aftermath plotline I have an idea to use a main character who has a form of amnesia, meaning that every day he wakes up with the last memories being of a time long before any of the events of the book happen.  This would allow me to write a perfectly linear account of his life post-apocalypse and the events that lead to him being a single parent but then edit it so that each day I choose to relate comes as a shock.  That would be both artistic and a way for me to indulge a little.  It would also allow for a deliberate confusion over what caused the apocalypse, how long ago it was and what society is actually like in the aftermath, all of which would make writing it easier.  However, there is still the hang up of having to write it all in order rather than the more interesting method of how it would be read.

In the Prehistoric plotline I have an idea about following a group of male hunters from the homo sapiens tribe as they encounter a family group of Neanderthal.  It is widely believed now that the Neanderthal worked in small family clan groups that would have had to have met up with other clans for breeding purposes.  Evidence from my own reading mounts that homo sapiens would have had female dominated, if male led, tribes moving around as well as singular or small groups of males between them - thereby creating a less family-centric tribal system.  The clash of that system alone would be interesting to write and explore were it not for the fact that I have no plot.

And then there's the one I intend to write.  Currently inert and lifeless as stone.  There's something in it, I know, but I can't seem to get any ideas out.

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?