R.B. Thurman's Blog, page 8

Becky.

In the beginning, She is known by her proper name, Rebecca.  But then, she decides to change that.

Ana gets up, timidly walking closer to the ship. “After our first session, I looked up some information on your upbringing, and I stumbled onto your school transcript. It seems you took a lot more than just mechanic classes. In fact, you took just about every course available in your school, passing every class with at least a four-point-one grade-point average.” She leans against the cockpit. “You could have gone half your junior year and graduated a year early, but you took more classes instead.” Rebecca moans. “I don’t understand, Rebecca. Why did you take more classes?”
She jumps out of the cockpit. “Call me Becky. Rebecca sounds so formal.” Looking at the greasy tools in her equally greasy hands and then looking up to Ana, grinning, she says, “And I do not feel very formal right now.”

Ana & Becky

‘Why?’ you may ask?  Before I answer that, understand that the Clouds of Thought are a method of perception (further explained in Synesthesia and The Clouds of Thought) that can affect a person’s perspective and understanding of, well … everything.  In much the same way sight affects a typical person.

If you woke up this morning, and you were suddenly colorblind, the effect would obviously be disturbing and troubling.  But after the initial shock, it may not seem readily disabling.  After all, you can still see.  You may even like the fact that you aren’t distracted by the technicolor cornucopia in which you might find yourself living.

However, under some conditions, it becomes surprisingly dangerous not being able to see color.

[image error]

Imagine you’re an electrician, and your boss comes to you this day, insisting you’re the only one who can handle this critically important job.  He quickly takes you to a site surrounded by peace officers in tactical gear, over to a trailer with men placing explosive containment gear on, along with getting you into some, and they drag you out to a field with this bundle of wires coming out a heavily welded barrel and a small alarm clock.  From a 2-way radio, your boss says all you need to do is cut the ‘correct’ red wires.  Have fun!

Should you survive and regain your sight of color, you can suddenly appreciate better the contrast it made in your life.  Becky experiences an event that gives her a similar experience. Let me allow her to explain, from another portion of the book:

She turns away from him wrapping her arms around her legs, looking down at the floor. “The cloud of thought has always been present in my life. I am a rare exception in being born with these gifts when most have the cloud manifest in puberty or maturity. When I look at my memories, I see no boundary between the cloud and the physical world.”
She briefly looks at her hand again, turning it to look at both sides. “I know now there is a point where the cloud stops and the physical world begins, but I never knew this before two days ago. They have always been the same thing. I found myself discovering the cloud anew, suddenly unsure of what it was, what it could do,” she places her hand around her legs again, “what I could see.”

Becky

My example is one way of viewing this.  But I think this video offers another, more interesting way of making such a discovery.  For this young woman, she discovers, much like Becky, that something she has always known was not something everyone knows (or in this case, sees), and even discovers it at about the same age.  While I didn’t see this video when I was developing the clouds of thought (I don’t think YouTube was around in the twentieth century), her ‘discovery’ of this is very similar for Becky.

Of course, this is only partially why she is now ‘Becky.’ Most of what makes her ‘Becky’ is in the book, and trying to explain it out of context would take a lot more than a couple blogs.  It’d be easier to read it for yourself! (Shameless Book Plug!)

The change though does introduce another dynamic: Richard is forced to adapt.  Remember, he doesn’t want to be married, and didn’t know this person when the book began.  And now, the person he knew has changed, for better or worse.  I could offer insight as to how he would view this change in her, but I think it is better experienced first-hand, since you can decide if you feel as Richard does about what he sees.

I could speak at length about her, but I think I will step back for now.  Her character, like Richard, is important to the story in various ways, but for me to talk further runs the risk of giving away too much.  For now, let’s turn to the place Richard recieves a portion of his education:  Earth.

You probably would like to know what’s happening on Earth in the future. Next month, we’ll focus on Earth and a few of its people, since they play a role in helping the ‘non-natives’ understand our world, and humans in general. We will start with a brief history of what was found on Earth when ‘they’ arrived.  What do you think was found?  Leave your comments below.

Thanks for visiting!  If you enjoyed this post, lease like and share! You can follow on Facebook, Tumblr, and please feel free to read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!), in addition to the chapters I add here. If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (I do a few book giveaways there, so you may want to check it out for that).  Your comments are welcome below.  Also, sign up on my contact page, and receive notifications for when the next blog arrives.

The Princess.

Princess Rebecca Maxia is a complex character for me to develop.  But, it’s mostly my fault that this is the case.

If you read the original draft that would eventually become this book, you would realize that a 13-year-old is not very insightful when it comes to courtship and marriage.  This 13-year-old would reveal in his writing a disdain for girls, and the obstacles they place before more worthwhile activities, like developing skills in the Illustrative Arts, and preparing a solid case for driving privileges.  At best, in the original draft, she was a prop; Richard was so old he was supposed to have a wife. However, it was clear that 13-year-old wasn’t sure what to do with her, since he seemed to think she had to make her presence known in the most annoying ways.  She spoke, she hung off Richard, she seemed to insert herself into his life in just the most obstructionist ways. She was in the way of the story! (… Ugh, why is she here?)

Which is sad.  That 13-year-old showed a lack of appreciation for the contribution of women, both in his life, and in this story. The last time I read that short as an adult, I shook my head in disappointment in that little boy.  Not long after, the composition book was lost to a water event in my basement.  It was not a major loss.

By the time I started writing this novel, I had … matured, we’ll just say.  But, one thing hadn’t changed: like that little boy, I had no desire to marry.  Ever.

So: How do you write a novel about a married couple, when you have no desire to marry?

You … improvise.  Consider that the nature of this marriage presented the only likely way I would consider marriage (at the time).  Which is by edict.  Against my will.  Because I had to.  An arranged marriage was the only way marriage made sense to me.  (Why would you do this voluntarily?)

In the initial iterations of the story, interactions between Richard and Rebecca were limited.  She only came into the story as a foil, or when I needed an extra character to do some talking.  She was still a prop.  Even with her unique abilities, it basically made her more useful, but she only appeared when her powers were needed, then she disappeared again.

By the 21st century, my views of women had changed to such a degree that I when I read the book after a long hiatus (see Lost and Found), I realized how neglected Rebecca was as a character.  When I started reworking and fixing the problems in the book, one thing I sought to change was her.  And really, every other woman in the book.  While few of my characters had the depth they needed, I realized I had done the women a particularly egregious injustice in my approach.

The first thing I did to fix her character was simply think about what would be going on in her life to make her who she is.  I asked myself questions: What was Thorvus-Maxia, her home world, like? Who would be her role models, her teachers?  What would be the ‘personality’ of her people? etc.  I started to realize she has depth, even if the answers to these questions were never in the book.  I dove deeper, looking at potential events (good and bad) in her childhood and onward, and how these would shape her as a person.

I invested so much into her as a character, I realized I needed to do the same for the other women (yes, and the men) in the book.  I wrote a lot of women into the book, espically among the ‘Earthlings,’ if you will, for a reason I’ll explain later.  But since there were now more characters, I decided to develop each of their life stories more.  Most of the characters you’re not going to know them like I do (sorry, I thought 125k word count was a good stopping point).  But their stories helped me understand each of them better, and how they would likely respond to the various things they face in the book.

What influences surround our Princess?

We will examine some events that our princess lives through, before her marriage to Richard.  In this excerpt, Richard is discussing some of her past with his friend Joe, after he attempts to get aquianted with his new wife:

Joe sips some of his float. “Then she may not want to talk. It could be an extremely difficult thing to venture into space again since her last experience was so traumatic and it happened at such a young age.” He takes a long sip. “How old do you think she was?” Richard thinks about it a moment.
“Well, it was about fifteen years ago. I guess she was about five or six.” He looks at Joe. “Why do you ask?”
Joe sips more of the float. “From what I recall of your people’s history,” he says, wiping his mouth with a nearby napkin, “most of her family was on that ship when it blew up.” He grabs a spoon, pointing it at Richard. “So think about it: You’re six years old. In the span of a few minutes, everyone you knew, your parents, your grandparents,” he counts them off with his free hand, pointing to each finger with the spoon, “your closest aunts, uncles, cousins, and all your closest friends suddenly were gone forever. Everyone you ever knew was gone in the blink of an eye.” Joe pauses for a moment, letting it sink in. “How do you recover? Where do you start? She’s too young to let someone know how she truly feels, and maybe people assume they know.”

Obviously, space travel is not ubiquitous on Earth today, but I’m sure we can picture being the sole survior of a catastrophe, one that claims the lives of your family. I think we can start to place ourselves in her world, see her world view.

We may even draw a conclusion like the one Richard has:

“I do not want to come across insensitive,” Richard responds, “but I would think she would be finished grieving her parents by today. And while space travel can be ominous, I find it surprising she could continue to have such a strong apprehension now since she has had ample time to work through her feelings.”

Depending on your own background, you can see how even the characters can draw conclusions about the other characters and their motivations, right or wrong.  You can decide for yourself how you would view the matter, whether you agree or disagree with Richard (feel free to comment below).  But this is not all our princess is dealing with.  After all, this was “fifteen years ago.”  What is she dealing with now?

“Well, consider this,” Joe then continues. “How would you describe the present state of affairs on Thorvus-Maxia?”

For most of us, we are unlikely to be the cornerstone of the government of where we live (I’m not expecting to have that expansive a reader base; trying to be realistic here), so the government will function in our absence, or even the absence of our family.  But this is a little different for Rebecca.

I was trying to decide what type of government most closely resembled Thorvian rule, and it is likely a constitutional monarchy in practice, but an absolute monarchy in reality.  The difference is obviously in the details, and while these two systems of governance vary greatly, I understand that describing her rule as one or the other wouldn’t be appropriate.  You will see that Richard has commented regarding her role in the governance of Thorvus-Maxia, along with others involved.  As a result of her families’ death, describing their government gets even more complex.

Consider the picture painted here of Thorvus-Maxia:

“Well, from what I have heard, their government seemed to be destabilizing for some time, even more since the death of her family.” He takes his head and places it on the crown his now bridged fingers. “Her presence is likely the only thing holding her people together.”
“I see,” Joe stares off into space. “So she’s spent most of her life without any reliable guidance, without something, or someone, secure she can look up to.” Joe pauses. “And even you know, from your own experience, being of royalty, you have a special set of problems that come with being a member of a monarchy.” Richard groans. “But your family is there to help you work through these problems.” Joe looks at his drink. “What if you had to face that alone?”
Richard shakes his head. “That is too much to ask of one person.”

There is more to consider regarding her role as a monarch and the responsibilities she has, but it would be better for you to read them in the book.

One final matter I wish to touch on regarding Rebecca is her emotional state.  There is a reason she behaves like she does, and there will be times her behaviour will not make complete sense.

An example:  Here, she has allowed Richard to join her, shortly after his debate with Joe:

I must apologize,” She admits. “I did not wish to be mean to you.”
“It is all right. I can accept you might want to be alone.” She raises her head, looking into Richard’s eyes.
“But that is not why…” She looks up to Richard. “I do not want to be alone. I wanted to be with you but…but…” Tears start to stream down her face. She tries to wipe some of them away. “I do not want to be alone anymore.” She sighs. “I have been alone all my life. This time, our time together, has been all I could look forward to for a long time.”
Richard frowns. “How can that be?”
She lays her head back on his shoulder. “All my life, I have been groomed for marriage to you.” She looks down at the pillow in her arms. “I knew it could free me from my loneliness …” She pauses.
“From the loss of your family,” he adds.
“Yes …” Her voice trails off. “When you mentioned coming to my world, it made me think about when they first told me you were coming, not long after I lost everyone.” She squeezes the pillow tighter. “I was only seven, but it scared me so bad, the thought of losing you too, I refused to allow it!”
Richard looks down at her. “You did not wish for me to visit?”
She shakes her head. “No, I really wanted to meet you, but …” She stops, wiping her eyes. “I could not afford to lose you! I was scared of losing you!” She looks around, her voice shaken. “Even now, being out here, I am always afraid. I fear something could happen, and I will be alone again!” She starts sobbing. “I could not live with that!”

If you like, you can comment below regarding what you’ve learned thus far about Rebecca.  I will tell you this is only part one.  Part two, we have to discuss ‘Becky,’ and how an encounter in the book helps to draw out our princess even more, leading to changes I think you will notice in the excerpts shared.  Plus, I will show why her explanation of the Clouds of Thought are especially revealing.   See you then.

Thanks for visiting!  If you enjoyed this post, please like and share! You can follow on Facebook, Tumblr, and please feel free to read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!), in addition to the chapters I add here. If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (I do a few book giveaways there, so you may want to check it out for that).  Be sure to sign up on my contact page, and receive notification on when the next blog arrives.

FYI – I will have a book giveaway starting this week (1/23/2018) on goodreads.com for The Silent Invader this week thru most of February!  Just do a search for “The final Tyberian King,” and it will take you right to it!

The Silent Invader – Chapter 1

Read The Silent Invader!  You can find the first chapter here.

The Clouds of Thought

 

(This is a continuation of my blog on Synesthesia, where I conceptualized ‘The Clouds of Thought’ for my book, The Silent Invader.  You may want to start there for context.)

In case you are wondering why I thought emotion-color Synesthesia was inspiration, given that Becky just described something more related to hearing than sight, consider the next phase of the clouds of thought:

“There is a second form of perception, where you can see what appears as a light mist cast everywhere you look.” She pauses. “Depending on your focus, the mist, or cloud can seem close and very dense, or very distant. But, this cloud only reacts to the firing of the synapses of people around you. The density of the cloud determines the fidelity of detail you perceive in thoughts.” She smiles. “You can even see when your own thoughts disturb it, if you concentrate. Like the sound of our thoughts, the synapse can create images in the cloud, often geometric patterns, depending on the level of focus in the thought. They even vary depending on how the synapse fires, and thought patterns will change in size and color because of the intensity or even the emotion.”
“Like anger?”
She smiles. “Or happiness. Obviously, seeing the patterns a thought makes, and then a person making that thought public, you can learn quickly what they each often mean.” She puts her hands on her shoulders, on top of Richards. “When a person has a creative mind, like yours, the patterns are even vivid pictures, even colorful pictures, and they so wonderful to see.”
Richard smiles. “So you are able to see the patterns my thoughts make in the air?” She nods again. “Well, I guess that is not so bad.”

Becky (Maxia) & Richard Tyberius

When I was writing my book, I used to draw prolifically.  So, the visualization of the colors swirling around, taking on striking patterns and colors was mesmerizing to imagine. You think about what she has described, and you might wonder how your own thoughts would look.  Mine would likely be organized chaos.  But, I had to use the emotion-color because of how complex it could potentially be.  Consider: do you feel only one emotion at a time? When you’re sad, are you only sad?  When you’re happy, are you only happy?  There can be undercurrents of emotions swimming beneath, and if each has a distinct color, they may actually produce quite the visual.  This also introduced another nice point:  She isn’t so much looking inside your head, as looking at what’s coming out of it.

For me, it was more striking how visualization and auditory cues were both more interesting and more revealing ways to show thoughts.  Suddenly, you would wonder what these images told her about the person, rather than simply know what they were thinking.  I can only scratch the surface of what the cloud could allow her to do, but there is so much still shared in this book on the matter.  And to be clear, this is only two types mentioned so far

[image error]Since these are separate, it makes it clear that even with this ability, I could make rules that would apply in unique ways for each.  For example, She points out that seeing is clearer than hearing, which can make sense.  Consider: would be easier to identify a particular animal by a picture, or by the sound (spoiler!) it makes? Obviously, if you’re familiar with what you are identifying, one or the other may be all you need.  But, if you know little, and were attempting to identify it solely based on a visual or a sound, which would be easier for you? (Leave your comments below)

While I have pointed out that there are distinctions for the two mentioned, you can probably guess what the third, and (for this book!) final type of ability is:

“There are very rare instances of individuals who have both.” Richard frowns. “With both, you can both see the patterns, and hear them.  When you have both, your depth with each is greater. A person can gain clarity of a thought sooner than with only the sound or sight.” She glances at her hands before folding her arms, hiding her hands.  “When you can only see a thought, you would only know their emotion, their focus, and possibly its direction of intent. Only hearing the sound, you would know the weight and intensity, possibly the subtle variances of multiple emotions being displayed, or which is most dominant. When you can see and hear it all, the two give you a perspective of not simply how someone is viewing a matter, the nuances in each will tell you who they are, even from a distance, even in a group. You will see their thoughts and know them as people, not simply a sound, and as you learn more, you can even see them as clearly before you, like they are sitting in this room with us.” She pauses, taking a moment look up at the stars. “Being able to focus on the thoughts of each person, you see further and clearer than your eyes, you can then see and hear the patterns of these thoughts, and understand without their public expression.”

Think about what she is saying.  With the combination of the two, they amplify each other to give an ability that can seem limitless.  She mentions first that “when you can see and hear it all, … the nuances in each will tell you who they are, even from a distance, even in a group.”  I don’t want to imply that it is impossible to find someone with just your ears when you’re in a crowd, or single out a particular person in a group picture.  Realize that she didn’t say how far away any of this is. In fact, one of her next statements that “Being able to focus on the thoughts of each person, you see further and clearer than your eyes,” she is implying that there can be some distance between the viewer and the subject viewed.  In the book, she is actually speaking of a specific instance that helps impress upon us just how far that can be.  How far?  Read The Silent Invader to find out.

Next week I will introduce you to the Princess, but let this little point sink in as you await this post:  When I wrote this book (the first drafts), not only was I single, I also had no interest in getting married.  So, imagine what a person like this would write about an arranged marriage.  Stay tuned.

Thanks for visiting!  If you enjoyed this post, please like and share! You can follow on Facebook, Tumblr, and please feel free to read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!), in addition to the chapters I add here, with Chapter 1 being added on Thursday (1/18/2018). If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (I do a few book giveaways there, so you may want to check it out for that).  Your comments are welcome below.  Also, sign up on my contact page, and receive notification on when the next blog arrives.

Synesthesia

As I developed the book, I decided I wanted the princess to have an ‘usual’ ability.  I wasn’t sure where I wanted to go, but it seemed being telepathic (see every thought), and later, empathic (see only their feelings), seemed the route for me.

Until I thought telepathy was cheating.  Allow me to explain.

Given the nature of telepathy and empathic abilities, you could potentially (and possibly, accidentally) create a character with unlimited insight into everyone and everything; you leave nothing to interpretation, and there is nothing to figure out on your own.  In fact a character, should the story make it difficult otherwise, could simply explain a difficult plot point, rather than allowing the story to present it.  I’ve heard this described as ‘showing vs. telling,’ with telepathy being more on the telling side of the matter.

This was what I found Becky doing at certain points in the story.  She would basically start reading minds when I couldn’t get the characters to talk it out.  This mostly happened with Richard (actually, I think it only happened with Richard.  I’ll elaborate when we get to her), so it became a reliable crutch to get me through the story.  Till I got full on writers’ block.

What makes this ‘telepathy/empathic ability’ different from any other ever written in a Sci-Fi novel?

When I read back through the story in the 21st century, I noticed how much she was bailing me out, and I didn’t feel like her role should be a know-it-all.  I wanted to throw telepathic/empathic stuff out the window, but I was felt like I needed something operating in a similar manner. Just with well-defined restrictions.

This is why these sorts of abilities seemed like a ‘cheat code.’ Why struggle to get this to make sense? Just tell people what the character is thinking, and move on? I thought.  As I tried to place restrictions in my revisions, the restrictions themselves came under question to me.  Why can she use them here, but not there? (Because I said so.) Why is her range this amount? (Same.) Why does she use them here, but not there? (Well, um..)

This ability was still only being a crutch.  When I realized I didn’t have a good answer to the above question, I knew I had to get rid of it. Completely.

Of course this meant I needed to take a different approach to this ability.

Which brings me to Synesthesia.

In the 20th century, I had read and heard stories (more likely, read AMA articles, see links below) about ‘Synesthesia.’ The simplest explanation I’ve seen for Synesthesia was basically when two or more senses get crossed, creating interesting associations.  Examples are sounds having color or words triggering a scent, or even letters having a color all their own.  The associations that had been discussed by the various websites points to certain types (at the time) being common, but really, they could be as unique as the person.  The research I did was exhaustive enough that I created a suitable ability that in its function it had synesthetic qualities.

One thing I will make clear about the research I did into Synesthesia: I did it a long time ago.  Long enough that I can’t be certain the sites I find now are the same ones I could then.  I remember them saying it was relatively rare, but some sites now say it could be more common than previously suspected.

Given the variety of types, you may be wondering which gave me the idea for defining Becky’s abilities.  It appears I chose emotion-color Synesthesia.  I say appears because I did this research on a computer I sold (see Lost and Found), and I didn’t move my research.  Oops.

And while I did appear to use this type as the foundation, it wouldn’t exclusively be the way that her abilities worked, or how she responded to stimuli. In fact, other types of synesthesia and other synesthetic features are involved in her abilities.  Synesthesia, in its purest form, appears to only be a response to what the senses pick up, and the signals being crossed in fun ways.  Or, a response to certain types of information, in the mind of the synesthetic person.  The research also seems to indicate that, like any sense, you can choose to ignore it, so as to continue undistracted in whatever task you engage in (like ignoring a flashing light or an annoying sound), or you can allow it to engulf your perceptions completely.  While aspects of this did make the cut for Becky, it appears I decided that even Synesthesia was too simplistic for the abilities I wanted for her.

The Clouds of Thought were born.

I now had an idea of how the abilities would operate to her, and Synesthesia gave a foundation to the methodology for the Clouds of Thought. This even made it clearer how it would help her know more things, while preventing her from knowing everything.  In a later blog, I may go into more detail regarding the Clouds of Thought, to help everyone understand what it can do.  The concept is more elaborate than this book allows for, and more encompassing than it first seems.  For now, let’s focus on what we do know, from this book.

Let me share an excerpt, with Becky explaining her ability:

She shakes her head. “Your thoughts will always be your own,” she assures. “A person cannot read your actual thoughts; they cannot see how you understand them. What we can see is how your thoughts influence the cloud, or sound of the world.”  She points to her ear.  “Most who can, are able to hear the disturbance the firing of a synapse makes on the cloud. Each thought type fires in different ways, makes different sounds and fire at different speeds. When you are watching a person, you will note when they make public a thought, and it helps you understand what you have heard. Our thought patterns, how our synapses fire for these thoughts is often similar between various persons, so you may understand the sounds of a thought, without knowing that person.” She looks toward Richard. “But if you are around a number of people, you will hear the sounds of many thoughts, making it difficult to distinguish an individual pattern. This is what is called the sound of the world, since in a group, there is always the sound of thought, and people who have this gift often seek this sound, or will separate themselves from it.”

Rebecca Maxia

I think @adele_domann put it best:

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I had a similiar thought when I started developing the Clouds of Thought. For me, thinking you know exactly what a thought is could actually be more dangerous than actually knowing a person’s thought. As technology has improved in our day, we can seemingly do something similar with a live scan MRI, and see how the brain reacts to various stimuli.  But likely anyone observing such a scan will assure you that such a scan is open to interpretation as to what you’ve just seen.  Are they reacting to the stimuli they just received, or did they just give way to flatulence?  The answer could become clear with time and repeated observations (let’s also hope for the former for that poor researcher).

What’s funny is I only shared a small part of how this works for Becky (I was afraid to share too much without an explanation of where the idea came from). In my tweet, I touched on what would appear to be the common form of this ability which she describes as the ‘Sound of the World.’

The ‘Sound of the World’ can be thought of as a sound exclusively produced when a synapse fires, and like Synesthesia, only those who can hear the Sound of the World can hear the synapses firing.  Likely, given the traffic in our head, since our thoughts aren’t just what we’re ‘thinking’ about, but would also include things like bodily function (like telling your fingers to stop pressing the “/” key, for exa/mple.  Sto/oooop i/t/!), so there would likely be a lot of background noise with whatever else is being thought.

The closest equivalence I could imagine is a white noise generator. If you’ve ever used a white noise generator, you will discover that ‘white noise’ is only one of the forms it produces (on my phone the white noise generator includes brown, purple, pink, blue, and violet noise.  And they each sound different).  While it could be described by me as static, it is clearly a form of communication for Becky.  A language, if you will.

Like any language, if you don’t understand what you’re hearing, it’s all noise (thus the comparision). Being aware that a conversation is being conducted in your presence (should you hear, or even see it) will not make all that is being shared robustly clear. Which is what makes her comment to ‘make public a thought’ important. Much like learning a language, you need context and common ground to understand what you hear.  Making public a thought gives her the reference she needs to understand what she just heard.  I discovered (much later in life) this was also a very effective way to learn another language.  Jumping, while saying the word ‘jump’ in a given language will give you the activity (in this example) to associate with the word you’re learning.  A way of creating a synesthetic sensation for yourself, by crossing what you hear with what you’re doing, and your mind retaining the association.  You may not jump each time you say the word, but you’ll think about it.

Next week, we will go into more detail regarding ‘the Clouds of Thought,’ and the other two ways Becky can use her skill. Leave your thoughts below.

Thanks for visiting!  If you enjoyed this post, please like and share! You can follow on Facebook, Tumblr, and please feel free to read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!), in addition to the chapters I add here. If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (I do a few book giveaways there, so you may want to check it out for that). Your comments are welcome below. Also, sign up on my contact page, and receive notifications for when the next blog arrives.

Some references regarding Synesthesia:

www.synesthesiatest.org

Neuroscience for kids (multiple additional references can be found here)

American Synesthesia Association

Everyday fantasia: The world of Synesthesia

This doctor knows exactly how you feel (Pacific Standard)

www.synesthesia.com

 

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The Prince.

Meet Richard Tyberius:

 

So since this is my signature log entry as captain—I like how that sounds—of my ship, let me formally introduce myself: my full name is Prince Richard Fitzgerald Tyberius, prince of the Tyberian Empire and heir to the throne. Technically, I am prince of the province of Allsophoria on my home planet of Alexandria, but my family has been the leading authority for quite some time, out of the three houses. My dad, the King, will be happy to tell you Alexandria is the most beautiful planet ever to be seen. But he is trying to promote tourism on our world.

Richard Tyberius, as ‘captain’ of his new (to him) ship, introduces himself in log entries that will recur at the beginning of each chapter. In this chapter, he explains his little adventure he is preparing to embark upon:

I am planning to surround up a few of my friends from high school who are still on Earth. I know it has been a few years, but I have been able to maintain contact with a lot of them since then, and I even managed to locate a couple I had lost contact with.

As a result of his log entries, you are given insight into his life and his people, in a way that would otherwise be difficult.  In case you’re not familiar with the book, he is not from Earth. He did live briefly on Earth.  And one of first things you may notice with Richard is that he’s not very old:

I just got out of Allsophoria Officer University … on summer break, in part because, being royalty, I am not yet required to go to university.

How old is he? You can read the novel to find the exact answer (Book plug!).  But, given this unique perspective (a prince, leader of his world, with a seemingly unlimited freedom of movement), it would be dangerous to assume he sees and knows all.  Or, anything, really.  As I mentioned in the previous blog (The Three Houses), there are times Richard clearly does not.

Consider this example.  Here is an exchange between Richard and one of his friends.  Moving from Earth to space takes place at a facility referred to as an ‘Interstellar Transit Center,’ or ‘Transit site.’  Richard refers to it as a spaceport, since he is flying a spaceship there, and this is his port of call.  His friend makes an observation about his chosen landing site:

Joe shakes his head. “I bet you’re the first person to come to this particular port in years.”
Richard looks at Joe in amazement. “What? You mean this is not the only spaceport in Iraq?”
“Of course not! There’s thousands of them around the world, and at least a half dozen of them here. You could have landed at the one closer to Baghdad,” Joe remarks. “This one’s out in the middle of nowhere!”

Ignorance is bliss, isn’t it?

Richard can only offer you a little of what is happening in the story.  Where he is most helpful is understanding the various places you will briefly visit at the beginning of the story.  Also, he offers insight into the dynamics of the Tyberian government, and its relationship with Earth.

In case you’re wondering, the people and government of Earth is in the story.  However, what we will see is not how Earth sees the Tyberian Empire, but how others (specifically, the Tyberian Empire) see Earth.

Here is one observation Richard shares:

But as if my life was not fun enough, my dad, the king, has informed me we will be meeting with members of the Pact, who are representing a bunch of planets that can barely defend themselves from anybody. Yes, my best friend is from a Pact world, but he is probably the smartest human there is. And they did not offer employment to him. So, I have reservations regarding their judgement of how serious a matter can be, when they cannot observe the obvious intellect and talent in Joseph Pike. Of course, they probably want us to assist them with something they cannot do against somebody who is not much of a threat to anyone except them. Oh well, I guess the universe does not circumnavigate myself after all.

Richard is making a casual observation with regards another character, Joseph Pike (We’ll discuss him a little later).  We likely could conclude he is showing a bias favoring Joseph, since they are friends.  As you read the book, draw your own conclusions on what Richard has observed, and how you would react.

I would also like to point out another matter some of Richard’s comments may already reveal.  Let’s consider one more exchange, to make this point more clear:

Richard notices Joe is staring at him. “What? What did I say?”
He takes a long noisy slurp of his shake. “I hope you didn’t say all of that to her.” The bartender quickly brings another float.
Richard quickly shakes his hands and his head. “Now, pause your horses! I was being polite and nice about it.” He folds his arms. “And did not discuss the separate rooms issue with her. She had rescinded my invitation by then.”

Think about what Richard has said.  Not so much over the matter which he defends himself, but his word choice.

Idiom:  an expression in the usage of a language that is peculiar to itself either grammatically (such as no, it wasn’t me) or in having a meaning that cannot be derived from the conjoined meanings of its elements (such as “ride herd on” for “supervise”)

-Merriam-Webster Dictionary

This is what Richard is striving for.  Since he received part of his education on Earth, he has heard them, and you may likely discern where on Earth he may have received his education, and therefore learned them.  Or, attempted to.

When I was writing his character, I originally thought he should use none of them correctly.  As in, every idiom he would use would have an inaccuracy variance of ‘ok, yeah, I think I understand …’ to ‘What!?!!’  But, it is interesting how difficult it can be to write not using idioms correctly, or changing them without making them impossible to understand. But, it is his struggle.

The book starts out as a friendly outing, as Richard stated, and it would seem the goal was simply an adventure of their own making.  But as this brief passage makes clear, all will not go to plan, and it won’t take long for this to happen:

Well, here I am, first captain of the new flagship for the Tyberian Empire.

In case you’re wondering, his first ship was not the new flagship for the Tyberian Empire.  It was more … humble, we’ll say.  How did this happen, among other changes, in less than a week?

You can learn more about Richard and his adjusted adventure in the book, including getting to know his new wife (this is among the other changes).  In a few weeks we will discuss the princess.  But first, we need to examine a concept that her character introduces in the book, and a human condition that inspired it for me.

Thanks for visiting!  If you enjoyed this post, please like and share! You can follow on Facebook, I’ve just added Tumblr, and please feel free to read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!), in addition to the chapters I add here. If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (I do a few book giveaways there, so you may want to check it out for that). Your comments are welcome below.  Also, sign up on my contact page, and receive notification on when the next blog arrives.

Thanks to my Readers.

I would like to thank everyone who has already read In Written Form in 2017, and the success it has already been for me.  I would especially like to thank all of my readers from overseas.  As you may have guessed, I live in the United States, but I’m happy to have you all as readers.  I find it ironic that I’ve had so many new readers and visitors to the site from the Republic of Éire, since that is the first country I visited outside the States. Hopefully, I can do something to show my appreciation very soon (hint, hint!)

R. B.

The Three Houses.

Let us examine a few excerpts from The Silent Invader.  I plan to allow the main characters, beginning with Prince Richard Tyberius, explain the matter discussed.

The following is his concise modern history of the three houses:

What I know of history explains that not long after our people began to travel in space again, about nineteen hundred years ago, two families settled Thorvus-Maxia, the Thorvian and Maxian families. As if you could not figure this out. What you may not be aware of is the fact about eighteen hundred years ago, we started a war with them for a reason that is lost to time, and we fought for three hundred years … Without need of saying, peace finally came about fourteen hundred years ago, but three hundred years proved to be long enough to develop and harbor animosity. And this animosity, though not as serious, continues down to this day.

The houses of Thorvus and Maxia, along with the house of Tyberius are the three houses mentioned in the book.  Each of these houses represent a party to an event even further back in their history.  One that the father (and current king on Alexandria) of Richard informs him of:

… at this time another family was trying to come to power.” He looks up to Richard, pausing. “No, they were seeking to return to power. They were headed by the grandson of the infamous Phalanx Thorvus. He sought to rule this new world, since his family lost control of Alexandria nearly two thousand years ago today in the fall of the Thorvus Dominion. He likely thought to put a rift between the two most powerful families on Alexandria, to accomplish his goal.

While an in-depth explanation could ensue on the particulars of that skirmish, what you will need to take note of is the desire for one house “to return to power.”  As you will see in the novel, the house of Thorvus is not the leading house.  In fact, by the king stating that the house of Thorvus “thought to put a rift between the two most powerful families on Alexandria,” it implies the other two houses exerted more influence.

Do not assume the house of Thorvus was harmless.  The king makes clear that they did accomplish their goal centuries earlier:

My research into the matter reveal the lineage of many of the historians of the day were predominantly of Thorvian descent and, thus, shifted the blame far away from their family … it was they who started the war that lasted for nearly three hundred years.

When this war was started, it caused serious divisions not only between the three houses, but between a husband and wife:

Within fifty years of discovering the new world, the queen moved to the other planet as well, with the rest of her family.

According to Tyberian history (each house has a record of events, you will learn) the queen, a noble of Thorvian descent, sided with her family in the conflict when she departed for the new planet. This planet was later called Thorvus-Maxia.  The planet became the home to two of the three houses, though after the peace accord, Alexandria remained the ‘capital’ of their worlds.

For these worlds, their peace comes from the absence of contact.  The three houses, as you will learn, have limited contact, and this affects what even Richard can learn about his prospective mate, a Maxian princess:

Then there is, of course, the rumors she is disturbingly hideous, which I do not believe. Well, not really.

For the three houses, avoiding war appears to be the aim of their actions, since Richard acknowledges an ‘animosity’ being present between them.  But,  simply maintaining the peace is no longer enough to avoid conflict.  There was more that needed to happen for their peace to continue.  The king relates a very simple statement made by the mediator of their peace, who is referred to as the Maelstrom:

… the Maelstrom said in order for the peace to be complete and to last, our families must unite.

This is the reason for the first point of contention for Richard: Marriage to the Maxian princess.  In his words, what he did know about the princess “is not at all appealing.”

While the tension between the three houses tests their efforts to be peaceful, it actually isn’t their source of danger. The wedding between Richard and the Maxian princess is to avoid that danger:

When they saw we were still separated and animosity had built up between us, they warned us of the doom we faced by not respecting their wishes. They said that within twelve hundred years’ time, our worlds would be destroyed because of this.

That seems still a long time, until you realize, as the king did:

The Maelstrom said this 1198 years ago as of tomorrow.

In the years leading up to that point, their arranged marriage was planned to prevent the danger ahead.  Now, this may seem a brief synopsis of the three houses, but that is not just by design; this book doesn’t go into the history of the three houses very much, simply because it only serves to establish the hierarchy of the houses, along with likely concerns for each house.  I will show later how this history influences affairs between the houses, but in this book the doom they face is the more immediate concern to the three houses, rather than how we got here.  Does it matter what people did 1200 years ago, if the threat to your life could arrive tomorrow?

Before we go into that danger, let’s learn more about our Prince and Princess.  Next time, we will start with Prince Richard Tyberius, crown prince of the house of Tyberius.

***

Thanks for visiting!  If you enjoyed this post, lease like and share! You can follow on Facebook, read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!), in addition to the chapters I add here. If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (I do a few book giveaways there, so you may want to check it out for that). For my overseas readers, there is still time (till the end of 2017!) to win a book here! Your comments are welcome below.  Also, sign up on my contact page, and receive notification on when the next blog arrives.

Publication, of ones’ self.

Can there be anything more delusional than the ‘ease’ of self-publication?

I realize this has happened now, but realize I started this process before there were ebooks.  In fact, I was debating whether I would use the new ebook format for publication, or simply take my chances elsewhere (I actually read some of the development docs on the ebook standard, mostly with regards security and whatnot).

To be clear, even Print on Demand (POD) was even new (to me, at least) by this point.  New enough that the novelty of going to an airport, requesting an open domain work (like Of Mice and Men), and get a hard copy to read on the flight was awesome!  And you can get the latest novels from (insert name of 2000s awesome author)! Wow!

But before we get into all the format choices and availability, let’s consider what self-publishing was when I sought this out in the early 2000s.  One entity that lives on in infamy is PublishAmerica.com.  The site still exists, strangely enough, but doesn’t appear to have been updated in a while.  Of course, when I started down the path of self-publication, they were the go-to site.

I don’t want you to think I didn’t trust anything on the internet.

I realize many sites were exactly what they appeared to be, and often were very useful.  One site I found particularly useful (and fun to order from) was Cyberianoutpost.com. At the time, they had the nerve to suggest if you ordered anything on their site by some ridiculously late hour (11pm CT sticks out in my mind) they would ship it next day. With free shipping (yes, thank you very much).  When I needed a computer with all the works, I was bad about testing this near midnight ordering, but they never disappointed. The next morning, my stuff was always right there under the portico.

They were later absorbed my somebody and my midnight orders came to a screeching halt (come on; do you really think they were going to get away with free overnight shipping forever?). The internet had earned my trust.

Websites, on the other hand, were prone to being beautiful, and misleading. Publish America was one of those fine examples.

I can’t say what was actually involved in using their services, but everything on the site made me more cautious about giving them anything.  I don’t think they said anything that was false.  I think they did misrepresent the opportunity they made available to you by getting published, and what the potential results from their efforts was likely to be.

The problem with their model is that while it required nothing (but your manuscript) up front, you did have a reduced commission from the sales of your book.  Now, if you looked into the pay system (like I did), as you sold more, you did make more, but given what people were saying about the nature of business (questionable edits, if any; poorly designed covers; book layouts that looked ‘homemade,’ etc.), I had my doubts.

What stopped me from working through them was how aggressively they pursued getting me to send my manuscript, and how unwilling they were to explain their process for preparing my book for publication.

I chose not to go this route.  But, I wasn’t left with many others, and once again, I needed ‘work.’  My new chosen field would take me away from writing for much longer, for good reason.

I have worked in a variety of fields.  But the one I’ve never done is construction.  In this case, plumbing, pipefitting, welding, and everything in between.  In this field, I spent a number of years, in school and at work, learning this trade one building at a time.  The end result was a skill that has served me well, kept me from starving to death, or going without running (or hot) water.

Today, it has helped me even bring this book to you: The Silent Invader.

I’ve spent the past few weeks sharing a little about how this book came to be.  Next week, let’s turn the page, and learn a little about the book itself.

***

Thanks for visiting!  Please like my Facebook Page (and follow!) and you can read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!) If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (Maybe even win a book!) For my overseas readers, you can win a book here!

For #Indiethursday, I will be publishing a portion of my book each month, starting with the Prologue on Dec. 21, 2017.  Look for it this Thursday!

I would also like to thank Bookfuel for their help in getting my book edited and prepped for publication.  They were supportive and patient with me despite my doubts (see Near Completion), and came through in splendid fashion.  Thank you ladies and gents of Bookfuel for your hard work!

Near Completion.

Early on writing this book, I wanted to believe the story would continue. However, considering all it took to get this written, this seems a formula for madness.

The challenge for me wasn’t writing another book.  It was getting this one published.

One thing few will likely notice (until now) is that the copyright date on the book is 1996.  (Yes, that was a while ago).  After completing it, I sought out a literary agent to assist in getting my book published (While I speak in ignorance of all this profession entails, for me those were the dark ages of book publication, as you will soon understand).

As defined by the Cambridge English Dictionary, a literary agent is “someone who represents a writer and tries to get his or her work published,” or “a person whose job is to help writers sell their books to companies so that they can be published.” Like any agent, they would represent you before a publisher (i.e. … actually no, I’m not going to name a publisher), in order to get either a contract or ‘deal’ for your book(s), or sell any amount of limited rights to its publication and distribution.

As you may realize, a book deal can be their income, in the form of commissions or a percentage of the deal they get for you. Now, it would seem that an agent would be ready to jump at the opportunity to publish your new original work.

Before I answer that, let me give you an example of three responses I received from two agencies.  None of these are in my hometown, as there were not an abundance of them there, and I did enough research to know that it would be better to work with an agent that sought the genre you wrote.  One was in the Denver area, and the other in NYC.  The NYC agent I contacted my snail mail.  It seemed the better option at the time. I didn’t send a manuscript, because that would be a waste of paper, I told myself.  If they’re interested, they’ll let me know.

I received a response: A form letter, requiring that I send ONLY the first five thousand words, and, if contacted, send the rest, only if it is AT LEAST fifty thousand words.  Just so you know, my book is north of one hundred thousand, so I was wondering what kind of short stories this guy was getting.  The fun part was where I had to send a postage-paid envelope with it if I wanted whatever I sent back.

In the twentieth century,  I was very green to this whole process.  I actually did research on copyright law shortly after I got this letter, because I felt like this was an easy way for someone to steal my brilliant work of fiction! (I was so young. It’s awesome to think about this now).  Understanding copyright law helped quell my fears.

However, the problem wasn’t simply mailing a phone book to this agent in the hopes of consideration (The postage! The postage!), it was that I might have to do this several more times.  Me was not that kind of wealthy.

I decided to go an alternate route, using a newly available resource: The Internet!

That is how I contacted the second agent in my example.  Searching for agents then was … sketchy. It was hard to tell who actually knew what they were doing, especially from their websites. I found that most were of two particular styles.

A well-done site might give the impression of a person who was qualified, until you realized they had no real background as an agent.  They were basically me: someone who could design a CSS-based website when this stuff was bleeding edge tech, to host a resume that had two unrelated jobs on it, and very little schooling. All in the hopes of being a graphic designer or something.  It was beautiful, but lacking in depth.

By contrast, many of the other pages were basically text on a colored background, with all the information you actually needed, put together in a format that could be described as ‘transitioning typewriter user.’  The agent was clearly well qualified as an agent. However, they probably should have asked someone else to make their site.

The agency in Denver was the happy compromise of the two in this particular search.  I was able to contact them by email, and could send the book, should I so choose.  This seemed a good match for my wallet.

When it came to working with an agent (or really, anyone), I prefer to establish a relationship with the other party before I start blindly sending all my info (Sorry about that. No, just kidding. I will never be sorry about that). So I contacted this agency via email, to find out what I needed to send them. Now, I realize after I received the form letter email from them that I could have read the website more thoroughly and found the answer to that.  But the letter was a little … condescending, we’ll just say.

In my preparations, I ran across an interesting detail: please have your manuscript edited/proofread for print before sending.  I’m pretty sure they mean using more than spell-checker.

Writing was not my vocation; I do not live and breathe writing, I do not live in a writing enclave, the people I know are not ‘aspiring’ authors debating their nascent works. And while I would’ve like to engage in this, I was too young (and poor!) to visit such groups for support.  Online groups, at this time, were rarely credible to me in this field (didn’t trust the internet, I guess).

I did have friends who read my novel, and more than a few made efforts to edit the most glaring mistakes.  But these edits were unlikely to be suitable to qualify my manuscript as ‘proodread.’

I decided to contact them again, addressing my concern regarding the need for a proper edit, before I send the manuscript.  Since this wasn’t addressed on their site, I noted as much in the email, stating that I wasn’t ready to publish, but would like to find out who they would recommend for proofreads.  The request in my eyes was innocuous, but even if it wasn’t, the letter that followed made it clear it didn’t matter what I thought.

I received the same form letter email. VERBATIM.  Not only did it not address my concerns, this email made it clear they didn’t even read mine!  At this point, I was less mad than annoyed.  What was the point of having this as a point of contact, if you had no intention of using it?

While this is only three instances with two agencies, many of my other interactions with agents at this time were similar.  Today, I attribute it to simply the sheer amount of available fiction that was seeking publication, and the inability of the market (i.e., the agents out there) to absorb it.  Still, it left me with a bad impression of the industry as a whole.

I decided then I would embark on self-publication.  After all, I would be master of everything, and it will all work out for the best.

…

…

Wait, what?  More work, FOR FREE?

***

Thanks for visiting!  Please like my Facebook Page (and follow!) and you can read excerpts from The Silent Invader @RB_Thurman (and follow!) If you prefer, you can also read my posts on Goodreads (Maybe even win a book!) For my overseas readers, you can win a book here!