M. Jonathan Jones's Blog: Spilt ink, page 7
June 7, 2016
A Pteronaut? What's a Pteronaut? Why, didn't you know...?
OK, with apologies to fans of The Gruffalo everywhere, my previous post was about inspiration in very general terms. This post is going to be about the specific ingredients that went into my book Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut. I'll try to avoid any spoilers: there shouldn't be anything in here that can't be guessed at from the cover-blurb.
I wrote RTRH (as my cousin calls it) alongside Thalassa: the world beneath the waves, and they're two very different books. I'll talk more about Thalassa in another post. RTRH is a post-apocalyptic sci-fi desert chase book. I wanted it to be very pure and simple, a bit like a desert appears to be: just a straightforward hunter vs. hunted story. The hunted is the Pteronaut; the hunter is the Crawler. This is a book with two characters (you could argue for more, but basically two) and no dialogue. In the very first draft synopsis, I had one line of dialogue, but at that time the Crawler hadn't really developed into what it became, so that single line of speech vanished very quickly.
The Pteronaut is humanoid, probably human, probably not genetically engineered. I'm not really sure, and it doesn't really matter. He is a survivor who travels the deserts for reasons which are hinted at, but which never become clear.
The Crawler is an ancient and very sentient machine. In my early drafts, the Pteronaut was the less human of the two. I wanted him to react to situations without thought, and even in the final version, he remains largely true to those origins. The Crawler is the antagonist, but in some ways perhaps, the one that a reader might understand a little more. The reasons for the Crawler hunting the Pteronaut are again hinted at but never really made explicit. This is a book that is a snap-shot of something bigger.
The setting is the dead red deserts. I'm not 100% sure whether this is Earth or, as I think I prefer, an incompletely and unsuccessfully terraformed Mars. There are some hints that the latter is more likely: it's cold but the atmosphere is mostly carbon dioxide, and there's lots of water in the permafrost. The lower Martian gravity (about 38% of the Earth's) would also help the Pteronaut to travel, but it doesn't actually matter. While writing the book, I steered clear of references to compass points and celestial phenomena. There is no mention of the Sun, only daylight, no stars, and no moon. Those options are all kept well and truly open.
So, the ingredients. Not many of those are literary. Richard Matheson's Duel: Novelette and the Steven Spielberg TV-film based on it were big influences. 2000 AD's Rogue Trooper: Future War is a strip I enjoyed as a tween/teenager, and his travails on Nu-Earth were in the mix. Other ideas about desert pursuit that I owe to youthful TV habits were series like Logan's Run, based on the book Logan's Run, and the TV series of the book and film of Pierre Boule's Planet of the Apes (the book is not as good as either, IMO), as well as too many trail-westerns to mention. The trigger for writing RTRH was Anthony Gormley's Angel of the North, as I said in my previous post, and other elements along the same lines were the flying knight scene from Terry Gilliam's Brazil, Walt Disney's Condorman, and the Rocketeer. Finally, the Crawler owes its existence to another 2000 AD favourite, Mek-Quake from A.B.C. Warriors: Khronicles of Khaos and Ro-Busters Book 1, as well as Philip Reeve's traction-cities from the Mortal Engines quartet, and of course the jawas' sandcrawler from Star Wars. The Crawler not really exactly like any of them: more like an intelligent oil-rig on wheels. One final ingredient for the desert setting came in the form of the Nazca Lines.
Add all that together, stir slowly on a low heat (preferably minus 5) in a carbon dioxide-rich environment for 6 years, and you end up with Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut. If you do take the plunge, I hope you enjoy it. Let me know.
I wrote RTRH (as my cousin calls it) alongside Thalassa: the world beneath the waves, and they're two very different books. I'll talk more about Thalassa in another post. RTRH is a post-apocalyptic sci-fi desert chase book. I wanted it to be very pure and simple, a bit like a desert appears to be: just a straightforward hunter vs. hunted story. The hunted is the Pteronaut; the hunter is the Crawler. This is a book with two characters (you could argue for more, but basically two) and no dialogue. In the very first draft synopsis, I had one line of dialogue, but at that time the Crawler hadn't really developed into what it became, so that single line of speech vanished very quickly.
The Pteronaut is humanoid, probably human, probably not genetically engineered. I'm not really sure, and it doesn't really matter. He is a survivor who travels the deserts for reasons which are hinted at, but which never become clear.
The Crawler is an ancient and very sentient machine. In my early drafts, the Pteronaut was the less human of the two. I wanted him to react to situations without thought, and even in the final version, he remains largely true to those origins. The Crawler is the antagonist, but in some ways perhaps, the one that a reader might understand a little more. The reasons for the Crawler hunting the Pteronaut are again hinted at but never really made explicit. This is a book that is a snap-shot of something bigger.
The setting is the dead red deserts. I'm not 100% sure whether this is Earth or, as I think I prefer, an incompletely and unsuccessfully terraformed Mars. There are some hints that the latter is more likely: it's cold but the atmosphere is mostly carbon dioxide, and there's lots of water in the permafrost. The lower Martian gravity (about 38% of the Earth's) would also help the Pteronaut to travel, but it doesn't actually matter. While writing the book, I steered clear of references to compass points and celestial phenomena. There is no mention of the Sun, only daylight, no stars, and no moon. Those options are all kept well and truly open.
So, the ingredients. Not many of those are literary. Richard Matheson's Duel: Novelette and the Steven Spielberg TV-film based on it were big influences. 2000 AD's Rogue Trooper: Future War is a strip I enjoyed as a tween/teenager, and his travails on Nu-Earth were in the mix. Other ideas about desert pursuit that I owe to youthful TV habits were series like Logan's Run, based on the book Logan's Run, and the TV series of the book and film of Pierre Boule's Planet of the Apes (the book is not as good as either, IMO), as well as too many trail-westerns to mention. The trigger for writing RTRH was Anthony Gormley's Angel of the North, as I said in my previous post, and other elements along the same lines were the flying knight scene from Terry Gilliam's Brazil, Walt Disney's Condorman, and the Rocketeer. Finally, the Crawler owes its existence to another 2000 AD favourite, Mek-Quake from A.B.C. Warriors: Khronicles of Khaos and Ro-Busters Book 1, as well as Philip Reeve's traction-cities from the Mortal Engines quartet, and of course the jawas' sandcrawler from Star Wars. The Crawler not really exactly like any of them: more like an intelligent oil-rig on wheels. One final ingredient for the desert setting came in the form of the Nazca Lines.
Add all that together, stir slowly on a low heat (preferably minus 5) in a carbon dioxide-rich environment for 6 years, and you end up with Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut. If you do take the plunge, I hope you enjoy it. Let me know.
June 6, 2016
Inspiration and the Benefits of a Well-upholstered Armchair
One of the questions that Goodreads asks when you join its author program is "How do you get inspired to write?" Another is "Where did you get the idea for your latest book?" Both of these questions tackle the mysterious (and, in some people's eyes, mythical) notion of inspiration and its sources. I don't think there's a very simple answer to either of those apparently harmless questions; if I'm going to answer them even partially, it'll take more than a word or two: quick, to the blog-cave!
Anthony Burgess claimed that inspiration is a myth worthy only for amateurs; in his eyes, writing was the product of concerted effort. It certainly is that - Thomas Edison famously said that "Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration," and while I wouldn't want to claim to be a genius (not at writing, anyway), it is hard work getting a story down on the page to the point where you'll let other people read it. As for whether inspiration is a myth, I don't think it is. But I do think inspiration is only partly unconscious.
I had the idea for Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut on the train from Edinburgh to London back in 2009. The actual moment of inspiration was the sight of Anthony Gormley's Angel of the North, but although the statue triggered some kind of alchemy of ideas, the base ingredients had been knocking about in my head for some time. I started writing the story right there and then, though it took several years for it to evolve to where it is now.
For Thalassa: the world beneath the waves, there was no sudden trigger or flash of imagination. I had an idea for a story about a girl who had never seen the sky. That simple idea gave rise to a question: the sky is such an amazing but everyday thing, so how could anyone not have seen it? Maybe if they lived underwater... And bit by bit, using part of an idea I'd written for another story about a cover-up, and cooking together all kinds of things that, again, had been in my head for a long time, the book came into being.
So I do believe that sometimes inspiration is an almost unconscious tying together of ideas. At other times, 'inspiration' is actually a process of weighing things up, testing things out, and adding together ideas that appeal in a much more conscious way, even if it starts from some small something which appeared as if by magic. Whichever route a book takes to become reality, the overall process of converting thoughts into actual words is not an easy one. There are enough blogs about the perils and pains of writing, so I'll spare you that.
One thing I think is certainly true: inspiration does not come when called. If you plan on sitting around and waiting for it, make sure you have a comfy chair.
Anthony Burgess claimed that inspiration is a myth worthy only for amateurs; in his eyes, writing was the product of concerted effort. It certainly is that - Thomas Edison famously said that "Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration," and while I wouldn't want to claim to be a genius (not at writing, anyway), it is hard work getting a story down on the page to the point where you'll let other people read it. As for whether inspiration is a myth, I don't think it is. But I do think inspiration is only partly unconscious.
I had the idea for Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut on the train from Edinburgh to London back in 2009. The actual moment of inspiration was the sight of Anthony Gormley's Angel of the North, but although the statue triggered some kind of alchemy of ideas, the base ingredients had been knocking about in my head for some time. I started writing the story right there and then, though it took several years for it to evolve to where it is now.
For Thalassa: the world beneath the waves, there was no sudden trigger or flash of imagination. I had an idea for a story about a girl who had never seen the sky. That simple idea gave rise to a question: the sky is such an amazing but everyday thing, so how could anyone not have seen it? Maybe if they lived underwater... And bit by bit, using part of an idea I'd written for another story about a cover-up, and cooking together all kinds of things that, again, had been in my head for a long time, the book came into being.
So I do believe that sometimes inspiration is an almost unconscious tying together of ideas. At other times, 'inspiration' is actually a process of weighing things up, testing things out, and adding together ideas that appeal in a much more conscious way, even if it starts from some small something which appeared as if by magic. Whichever route a book takes to become reality, the overall process of converting thoughts into actual words is not an easy one. There are enough blogs about the perils and pains of writing, so I'll spare you that.
One thing I think is certainly true: inspiration does not come when called. If you plan on sitting around and waiting for it, make sure you have a comfy chair.
June 1, 2016
5 things about writing
A bit of a hiatus in posting because I've been using the fragments of spare-time I have these days to write a couple of short-stories: one a steampunk fairytale, and the other some sci-fi horror. I have now posted the steampunk story The Woodcutter and the War-walker on Wattpad and Fictionpress.
Anyway, this post is entitled "5 things about writing." Not 5 facts about writing, since these are opinions, and not 5 tips about writing, since that implies I am privy to effective writing wisdom, and current sales figures suggest otherwise... These are 5 things that have occurred to me over the last few years, and in the future I may view them as tips on how not to do it; we'll see. Here goes:
1) It's OK to start with the weather.
Elmore Leonard says "no", so who am I to argue? But aside from being a mood-setter, the weather may well function as an antagonist of sorts (as it does in Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut), in which case it's not really weather. Or so says I.
2) Write what is right, not what you like.
There are bits of my books - words, mostly, but not always - that I don't like much. I used to think that a book I wrote would be like a child, viewed with no regard for its imperfections. In fact, it's more like a partner (sorry, love), that you cling to regardless of their faults. So I don't much like the word 'Tectocalypse', for example, which is the End of the World in Thalassa: the world beneath the waves. But, I figured, what would people call a tectonic apocalypse? Tell me I'm wrong
So, write what the story and the setting and the characters dictate, even if you don't much like it at times.
3) You don't have to solve everything.
There's a bit in Thalassa: the world beneath the waves where one character writes and organises his weapons at the same time. How would he do that with just two hands, I pondered? I spent some time imagining, then trying things out, and then finally I realised this guy is more dexterous than me, and he just did it. Sometimes, a little slack is fine, as long as it's kept to the right places.
4) Covers don't sell books, titles do.
OK, a very personal one this, and a claim made in view of the fact that I did my own covers (I'm reasonably happy with them, though the printed colours differ from those on my monitor). Skimming through the sci-fi books online, you see a thousand permutations of (i) exploding space-vessel or (ii) main character adopting 'don't mess with me' pose (thanks to Jason Pym for putting that so succinctly). They may be well done, but I end up skimming past them. It's the titles that catch my eye. If I'm looking for action and adventure, then something interesting, snappy, but not too '90s era Jean-Claude van Damme', if you know what I mean (bless him). Again, I'll probably kick myself for this in years to come, but right now it's true to me.
5) Writing is never the problem, it's the solution.
A sentiment I've expressed elsewhere in answering the question on writer's block. If I get stuck, it doesn't always help to try to figure things out in my head. Writing the scene, or an alternative, shows me new perspectives and solutions, even if I don't use them in the end.
That's all for now. More nonsense later.
Look out for the giveways, and happy reading/writing.
Anyway, this post is entitled "5 things about writing." Not 5 facts about writing, since these are opinions, and not 5 tips about writing, since that implies I am privy to effective writing wisdom, and current sales figures suggest otherwise... These are 5 things that have occurred to me over the last few years, and in the future I may view them as tips on how not to do it; we'll see. Here goes:
1) It's OK to start with the weather.
Elmore Leonard says "no", so who am I to argue? But aside from being a mood-setter, the weather may well function as an antagonist of sorts (as it does in Race the Red Horizon: the Flight of the Pteronaut), in which case it's not really weather. Or so says I.
2) Write what is right, not what you like.
There are bits of my books - words, mostly, but not always - that I don't like much. I used to think that a book I wrote would be like a child, viewed with no regard for its imperfections. In fact, it's more like a partner (sorry, love), that you cling to regardless of their faults. So I don't much like the word 'Tectocalypse', for example, which is the End of the World in Thalassa: the world beneath the waves. But, I figured, what would people call a tectonic apocalypse? Tell me I'm wrong
So, write what the story and the setting and the characters dictate, even if you don't much like it at times.
3) You don't have to solve everything.
There's a bit in Thalassa: the world beneath the waves where one character writes and organises his weapons at the same time. How would he do that with just two hands, I pondered? I spent some time imagining, then trying things out, and then finally I realised this guy is more dexterous than me, and he just did it. Sometimes, a little slack is fine, as long as it's kept to the right places.
4) Covers don't sell books, titles do.
OK, a very personal one this, and a claim made in view of the fact that I did my own covers (I'm reasonably happy with them, though the printed colours differ from those on my monitor). Skimming through the sci-fi books online, you see a thousand permutations of (i) exploding space-vessel or (ii) main character adopting 'don't mess with me' pose (thanks to Jason Pym for putting that so succinctly). They may be well done, but I end up skimming past them. It's the titles that catch my eye. If I'm looking for action and adventure, then something interesting, snappy, but not too '90s era Jean-Claude van Damme', if you know what I mean (bless him). Again, I'll probably kick myself for this in years to come, but right now it's true to me.
5) Writing is never the problem, it's the solution.
A sentiment I've expressed elsewhere in answering the question on writer's block. If I get stuck, it doesn't always help to try to figure things out in my head. Writing the scene, or an alternative, shows me new perspectives and solutions, even if I don't use them in the end.
That's all for now. More nonsense later.
Look out for the giveways, and happy reading/writing.
May 22, 2016
Goodreads Giveway during the month of June!
OK, so I promise I won't be one of those people who only ever use the blog to advertise their up-and-coming book events, but this has to be done.
From 00.01 am June 1st PST (8.01 am UTC) to 23.59 am June 30th PST (7.59 am July 1st UTC), five signed first edition copies of BOTH of my books, Thalassa and Race the Red Horizon will be offered in Goodreads Giveways. Sign up for your chance to win.
Preview chapters are available on my website. Take a look. If you do sign up but don't win a copy, Kindle editions of both books will be available for free download in July (more on that later). If that's no good and you prefer print to pixels - and who could blame you? - you might just have to buy a copy...
From 00.01 am June 1st PST (8.01 am UTC) to 23.59 am June 30th PST (7.59 am July 1st UTC), five signed first edition copies of BOTH of my books, Thalassa and Race the Red Horizon will be offered in Goodreads Giveways. Sign up for your chance to win.
Preview chapters are available on my website. Take a look. If you do sign up but don't win a copy, Kindle editions of both books will be available for free download in July (more on that later). If that's no good and you prefer print to pixels - and who could blame you? - you might just have to buy a copy...
May 18, 2016
Get a blog, they said
So, I've written two books (Thalassa - the world beneath the waves and Race the Red Horizon) and self-published them, and now I want people to read them. I've done the free Kindle giveaway (211 downloads!), had some views on Kindle Unlimited, and even got a 4-star review on Amazon.com (thanks Terry, whoever you are).
Now things have flat-lined a bit. I've sent out some freebies and in June I'll be doing a Goodreads giveaway too, one for Thalassa and one for Race the Red Horizon, and hopefully that will generate some interest.
But people keep telling me to do a blog. I suspect this is mainly because nobody knows how to market anything these days, since, surely, I say, that means I'm trying to market two different kinds of things instead of just the books... It's like chucking pebbles on a beach, lapped by the waves of a vast and implacable digital ocean. And they look at me and roll their eyes and think 'Luddite'. Maybe they're right.
So here I am. I've taken the plunge. I've cast my pebble onto the beach. I try to spend as much of the (rare and precious) spare time that I have actually, y'know, writing, so I hope this won't take over. The plan is to post the odd thing here, and see what happens.
Enjoy the pebbles.
p.s. This blog also appears at www.mjonathanjones.com/blog
Now things have flat-lined a bit. I've sent out some freebies and in June I'll be doing a Goodreads giveaway too, one for Thalassa and one for Race the Red Horizon, and hopefully that will generate some interest.
But people keep telling me to do a blog. I suspect this is mainly because nobody knows how to market anything these days, since, surely, I say, that means I'm trying to market two different kinds of things instead of just the books... It's like chucking pebbles on a beach, lapped by the waves of a vast and implacable digital ocean. And they look at me and roll their eyes and think 'Luddite'. Maybe they're right.
So here I am. I've taken the plunge. I've cast my pebble onto the beach. I try to spend as much of the (rare and precious) spare time that I have actually, y'know, writing, so I hope this won't take over. The plan is to post the odd thing here, and see what happens.
Enjoy the pebbles.
p.s. This blog also appears at www.mjonathanjones.com/blog
