Jeremy Zimmerman's Blog, page 5

28 Days of Night Vale Later

So, I got involved in one of those secret penpal things on Tumblr. A couple of them actually. One in particular was through a Welcome to Night Vale blog which paired up users with secret penpals. We were to write to them throughout February and reveal our secret identities on the 28th. It wasn’t an ideal thing, since my penpal never contacted me, the organizer got huffy when I had asked indirectly about it (because there had been previously posted instructions), and the person I was the secret penpal for never acknowledged receipt of anything I sent her.

But I had a stupid amount of fun writing these. So after the first couple days I started sending them to Dawn as well. And then I thought, “I should just post these all on my blog!”

I hope you enjoy one of my brief forays into, “This is sorta like fanfic, isn’t it?” Besides Night Vale, the only things I knew my secret penpal was into were Avengers and Supernatural. So if you’re wondering why there are superheroes and an Impala in Night Vale, that’s why.

Day 1: Hello. I am your new pen pal. I heard you like Night Vale, so I set a stop sign on fire and wept at the meaninglessness of existence. I hope you enjoy this month. – U. Pynpel

Day 2: John Peters (you know, the farmer?) has been having crop circles appear in his imaginary corn fields. I sure hope it’s just a prank and not aliens. Because aliens are Forbidden. – U. Pynpel.

Day 3: Good morning! I imagine at this point you are wondering my gender. And I don’t want to leave you in suspense: I’m an amorphous genderless blob, covered in oozing orifices that whistle tunelessly. I enjoy spiraling into myself, like a perpetual whirlpool. I also like Twin Peaks. Looking forwarding to talking again soon. – U. Pynpel

Day 4: All life is a foam sizzling across the surface of this rocky orb, hurtling across space. One big chemical reaction starting with goop in the ocean and ending with smart phones. Except for angels. They are something else entirely. And really, screw those guys. They suck. – U. Pynpel

Day 5: Those jerks at Desert Bluffs are at it again. They stole our high school’s mascot, Zippy the Twenty Foot Scorpion. But we fooled them this time: We can activate his murder protocols by broadcasting “Never Gonna Give You Up” at high volume over their city. How do you like being rick-rolled, Desert Bluffs Vultures? – U. Pynpel

Day 6: My first name is Uzumaki. That’s what the U stands for. It’s Japanese for “spiral.” I am named Uzumaki because I like spirals. I like spirals because my name is Uzumaki. Spirals are a madness in your soul that spiral constantly inward, tightening the bowstring of your sanity till it snaps. Cinnamon rolls are also spirals. So spirals are also delicious. – U. Pynpel

Day 7: A 1967 Chevy Impala was seen driving down the roads of Night Vale today. It was driven by angels. I don’t trust the motive of these angels. Never trust anything that is ten feet tall and fits behind the steering wheel of a muscle car. It is clearly not natural. – U. Pynpel

Day 8: I hear the Night Vale City Council is creating its own superhero team. They call them the Castigators. The defend the Earth from threats You Must Not Know. They also defend against Steve Carlsburg. Because really, that guy just ruins everything. They’ve put Mikaela Torment in charge of this. She’s the Faceless Young Woman Who Secretly Fights Crime. Her grandmother lives in your house. – U. Pynpel

Day 9: The other day the angels in the Impala ran afoul of Night Vales superheroes, the Castigators. It utterly disrupted the give away of free apple slices at the Arby’s. But after a battle of epic proportion, everyone went out for ice cream at the newly re-re-opened waterfront shopping district. Boy, I sure love ice cream. – U. Pynpel

Day 10: In the news this morning I read that Desert Bluffs has created their own local superhero team. They called them the Desert Bluffs Castigators. I guess those lamers in Desert Bluffs can’t come up with their own names for things. I haven’t seen anything so sad and strange since they declared October 29th, 1984, Gobot Day. Man, I would hate to live there. – U. Pynpel

Day 11: The sun’ll come out tomorrow. It’s the night of the sun’s debut. The sun is of marriageable age. But be careful when courting the sun, because you might get burned. 9,940.73 degrees Fahrenheit. You might want to put some aloe on that. – U. Pynpel

Day 12: I wish I could be as carefree and wild, but I got cat class and I got cat style. I got cat ears and I got cat smile. I got cat woes and I got cat denial. I got cat doom and I got cat oblivion. – U. Pynpel

Day 13: That feeling? You know, that feeling in your gut? That’s your biological reaction to the realization that you are small in a vast cosmic void. But hey, how about those Night Vale Scorpions? We really stuck it to Desert Bluffs. And talking about sports sure is more fun than the existential dread that fills our lonely moments. – U. Pynpel

Day 14: And now, the weather.

Day 15: Hello friend. Have you heard the good news about blood stone circles? It’s the way of our people. Especially my people. I was conjured forth in a blood stone circle, moist and wheezing. My mother is really proud of me. – U. Pynpel

Day 16: I know it’s weird talking about my mother when I’m a genderless amorphous blob. But “parent” is just too impersonal and when you consider I am a piece torn from her body, it seems more motherly than fatherly. – U. Pynpel

Day 17: But enough about me. Let’s talk about you. The tiny mote that is you in the vast cosmic cycle of existence. Gigalight years of space and yottaseconds of time, an infinitude of raw existence. Against all this you are nothing but a small speck of molecules clustered together. How you holding up? Your family doing okay? How about that local sport team? – U. Pynpel

Day 18: When you wish upon a star, don’t forget that the star may have been dead for thousands of years before the light ever reaches you. So be careful what your wish for. Your wish might be granted by the vengeful spirit of a dead star, the intent of your wish corrupted by sloppy wording. Next thing you know, your life is just another horror movie directed by Uwe Boll. And no one wants that. No one. – U. Pynpel

Day 19: The angels in the Impala told Old Woman Josie that they were hunting demons. Which is a pretty racist thing to say. Knowing the hierarchy of angels is strictly forbidden, but hypothetically speaking one could say that demons are really just displaced angels. Refugees seeking asylum from a cosmic war that has ravaged their native plane. But don’t repeat that to the Sheriff’s Secret Police. I’m just saying. – U. Pynpel

Day 20: I hear that there will be a reality show filming in Night Vale. It’s called “What Are You Doing Today?” It will feature you doing things. You will be observed in even the most unlikely of locations, edited to make you look your worst. Try not to pick your nose too much. You might end up as a nose-picking reaction GIF on Tumblr. – U. Pynpel

Day 21: We’re crowdfunding the apocalypse. We’ve decided that the world needs a new vision of the end of the world. So we’ve decided to go with Zoroastrian eschatology. It’s called “Frashokereti.” It’s just a fun sounding word and it’s easy to mistake it for a Greek pastry. “I’m going to back this Kickgogo. I had Frashokereti once in Greece and it was amazing.” If you’d like to back us, walk out on your lawn and cower against your front door. – U. Pynpel

Day 22: Warren Zevon once saw Carlos drinking a pina colada at Trader Vic’s. His hair was perfect. Warren Zevon fell in love instantly. Werewolves have that effect on people. Cecil was doomed from the beginning. Doomed to love a beautiful, perfect werewolf. – U. Pynpel

Day 23: The undead of Night Vale are organizing a rally to support undead rights. You can show your support by putting a Gray Rainbow sticker on the back of your car. The name of the campaign for promoting undead unity and rights is called “Fifty Shades of Gray.” I think they might be making a movie of it. – U. Pynpel

Day 24: You spin me right round, baby, right round. I’m stuck hovering in mid air, spinning right round. I wish you’d stop. I’m getting a little dizzy and I keep bumping into the wall. This is nothing like a record. – U. Pynpel

Day 25: Do you recall what was revealed the day the music died? Do you remember it exactly? What was in the bag the music was holding? Did you tell anyone? We may need to burn the whole house down just to cover the evidence. But hey, you still got your health, right? – U. Pynpel

Day 26: Have you been to visit the doom monger? You know, the old person of indeterminate gender down at the farmers market. He or she sells blights, scourges, banes, curses. You know, the usual. My best friend was looking for something to liven up her married life. So I got them a set of poxes, one for each side of their family. Poxes always get the party started. – U. Pynpel

Day 27: Tomorrow’s the day. The mask comes off. I’ll shuck the gooey membrane that covers my amorphous form, and spill forth my gelatinous innards to steam and dry in the cold morning light. What will be left of me? What can be left of me? I’m hoping I become a ginger. Maybe a woman. Maybe a ginger woman. Or a gingerbread woman. I’m hungry now. I’ll talk to you later. – U. Pynpel

Day 28: This is me. Unveiled. I’m neither a woman nor ginger. Nor gingerbread. I don’t think I’m even a Time Lord. Overall, I’m very disappointed with this unveiling. I think I’ll go sulk near the Dog Park. Not at the Dog Park, mind you. Just nearby. I find the proximity of hooded figures to be soothing, like a cool breeze that settles in your chest and rattles in your ribs for the remainder of your meager days. – U. Pynpel

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

RustyCon 2014 After Action Report

A few weeks back, I attended the 31st annual RustyCon, one of our local general fan conventions. It boasts a population of 500-700 attendees and prides itself on being a very family-friendly convention. For this con, I was attending more as a panelist than anything else.

This was, perhaps, the best experience I’ve had at this convention to date. Some of it was due to seeing friends there that I hadn’t expected. Having people I know at conventions really influences how I feel about the convention. It was nice to have people there that I could feel comfortable around.

I also got the impression that there had been some shake-ups and new people were managing things. The panels I was on were much more robust in attendance. The last couple years I had at least one panel, usually on a Sunday, that had no attendees and none of the other panelists show up. That didn’t happen at all this year. People generally showed up when scheduled and most panels had at least as many attendees as panelists. I think the panels could often have gotten by with fewer panelists, but everything seemed to go fine.

I was on a mix of writing and gaming panels. I think I fared pretty well on the gaming panels once I got used to being a panelist. I think I at least didn’t look bad on the writing panels. The hardest along those lines was the one on self-publishing. In part because much of the discussion revolved around areas I was less familiar with. In part because I shared the panel with Guest of Honor Todd McCaffery. (Who was a really nice guy, by the way.)

There was only one panel that I regretted signing up for, and it had nothing to do with the quality. I’d put in a relatively low priority offer to be on a panel about LGBTQ characters in fiction. I figured, “I’ve written queer characters. I can wing it if I have to.” I even polled friends so that I could provide names of books that featured positive examples of LGBTQ characters.

Let me assure you how mistaken I was. I ended up being put on the panel and was the only straight cis-gendered male present. Everyone else diverged in at least one category, if not multiple. I was out of my depth on the subject. Everyone was very polite, but I felt like an idiot for thinking I could fake being on this panel. And I didn’t have a chance to use my list. But I’ll provide it at the end.

I have wondered in the past whether, because I’ve written diverse characters, I should offer to be on a panel about diversity. I think the answer is pretty definitively, “Nope.”

The only other hitch I experienced with the convention was that there was some confusion regarding when I was available. I know that at least one other panelist had encountered the same difficulty. It was easy enough for me to adjust my schedule that I didn’t say anything to the programming organizer. Given how hard it probably was putting that all together, I didn’t want to fuss.

After the positive overall experience I had this year, I am really looking forward to next year.

And now, my book recommendations from friends featuring LGBTQ characters:

I’m Here, I’m Queer, What the Hell Do I Read?
Most things by Elizabeth Bear
The Kusheline Series by Jacqueline Carey
Indigo Springs and Blue Magic by A.M. Dellamonica
Swordspoint and The Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner
Snapshots From A Black Hole & Other Oddities by K.C. Ball
The Mercy Thompson Series by Patricia Briggs
The Sarah Beauhall Series by J.A. Pitts
Ascension by Jacqueline Koyanagi

Spin State by Chris Moriarty

Astreiant series by Melissa Scott

When the Sea is Rising Red by Cat Hellisen

The Steel Remains and sequels by Richard K. Morgan

The Bone Palace by Amanda Downum

Everything by Malinda Lo
The Gaylactic Spectrum Award Nominees
The Last Herald Mage Series by Mercedes Lackey
Ghost Hold by Ripley Patton
The webcomic Gunnerkrigg Court by Tom Sidell
The Kate Daniels Series by Ilona Andrews

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

More Thoughts on “Being a Writer”

A while back I wrote a bit on the notion of whether or not someone is a writer, prompted by a mean response from Brian Michael Bendis. Even after posting it, I’ve mulled it around a bit. It sometimes takes me a while to process something, and the processing never really ends.

The thing that I keep thinking about is this: Harper Lee.

In 1960, she published To Kill a Mockingbird. It was a bestseller and won her the Pulitzer Prize in 1961. She published a couple essays after that, but that’s it. According to Wikipedia, she started writing a couple other books, one of them in the 1980s, neither of which she finished.

In 2011, a friend of hers shared the reason she gave for not writing again. “Two reasons: one, I wouldn’t go through the pressure and publicity I went through with To Kill a Mockingbird for any amount of money. Second, I have said what I wanted to say and I will not say it again.”

But she did start writing other stuff at one point. I wonder at what point she went from working on other projects to not writing anymore. Did she have writer’s block?

If Harper Lee had said she had writer’s block for 20+ years, would you say, “Maybe you’re not a writer?”

Not every writer is Harper Lee. Heck, some writers aren’t even Dan Brown. But if you hit a slump of any sort, at what point do you lose your ability to call yourself a “writer”? There’s no answer beyond the one you decide to believe in. The only real thing you can say that if you aren’t writing something, nothing is getting written.

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

Live from Night Vale, it’s Thursday Night!

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

Earlier this month I had the opportunity to see a live performance of the podcast Welcome to Night Vale. A friend had envied my ability to attend and asked to hear about what it was like. So this is my attempt to convey that for her. I will avoid spoilers, as this is a touring show and don’t want to ruin any surprises for possible future audience members.

We arrived probably an hour before the doors opened and found that the line of people waiting to get in for the first show already stretched a block and a half out. In line were many people who were dressed in costumes. There were a couple Glow Clouds, at least one Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your House, several hooded figures, some Eternal Scouts, at least a couple interpretations of Cecil and Carlos (though not my favorite), and a librarian.

Meg Bashwiner, whose voice is usually heard at the end of each podcast, MC’ed the show. I’ve heard her voice so many times now, that it was immediately recognizable without introduction. (But she did introduce herself.)

The show opened with musician Jason Webley performing several of his songs while playing either a guitar or an accordion. With some songs he was accompanied by violinist L. Alex Guy. I’d seen Webley open for a reading of Neil Gaiman’s, but that performance hadn’t stood out the same way this one did. He had a small platform he stood on while he played, stomping occasionally in time to the music. The sound resonated through the theater far better than I would have expected, pounding a rhythm through the air. It lent a primal feel to the songs he performed. But I’m hardly a music expert, so it could be I’m just easily impressed.

After Webley’s act, Cecil Baldwin took the stage and did his “broadcast.” When I’d first heard the broadcast, the image I had in my head was that of someone who looked like the prototypical WASPy 1950s news broadcaster type, a bit like J.R. “Bob” Dobbs. Various fan interpretations have shifted that view some. I’ve never really thought of his character looking like the actual actor. Despite having seen several pictures of Baldwin, he’s never fit in my head as his fictional podcast persona.

The immediate thing that struck me as he began the show was that his voice was warmer than it is on the podcast. Normally his voice sounds really deadpan to me. But live his voice seemed much friendlier and intimate. A difference of audio production? Perhaps the result of multiple recording takes versus an unfiltered presentation? I don’t know. I suspect that the surfer-dude tone that his voice takes on in some parts of the podcast is closer to his real way of speaking. But I don’t actually know, as he never spoke out of character.

There was also his physical presentation, which I would not have anticipated from just seeing still images of him. Though the whole thing was mostly treated as though it was a strictly audio presentation, he would gesture and flourish as he read on the stage. He reminded me of a strange mix of the dean from Community (Jim Rash) and Jack Skellington. It was at once both flamboyant and inhuman, especially in how he used his hands. From pictures I’ve since seen of him with Wil Wheaton, I think he might also be a giant. Either way, it helped his voice fit with his face in my head. Because how I imagine things is very important.

He was occasionally joined at different points by Webley and Meg, who each took on roles in the audio drama. When they did “the weather,” it was also Jason Webley who played with a new song created for the tour.

All told, it was a relatively short show. Somewhere between 60-90 minutes? And we were hurried out quickly so that the second performance could happen. But despite the relative brevity, I had a lot of fun. The fans of Night Vale bring a really wonderful energy to the thing. I don’t often understand fan culture, but this time I felt at home with this flavor of weird. And there was an audience participation part of the show that was amazing, unannounced, and almost seemed to happen spontaneously.

How to Be a Real Writer

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

So this thing happened on Tumblr, and everyone lost their shit. Which is the way of Tumblr, I guess. But it started with someone asking Brian Michael Bendis, “what advice do you have for someone that has had writers block for the past 6 or 7 years?”

this will sound harsh but you’re probably not a writer.

writers write every day. it’s ok, not everyone is.

but if you consider yourself one, get off your ass and get back to work!! write about why you haven’t been writing . anything. just write.

And people lost their shit in both directions. You can see some of it here. There’s some pretty dickish things said on both sides. I had several moments of “Where the hell did that even come from?” Because, seriously. Seriously. Don’t just dump out whatever issues you have on people with no reason.

On the one hand, I generally try to avoid coming down with Big Opinions about a lot of things. I rarely feel like an expert on anything, so why should I comment? But the notion of “being a real writer” is one that grates on me. And I was encouraged to write this by a friend, so here’s my take.

First, if you want to call yourself a writer, call yourself a writer. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter to me if you’ve never written a thing in your life. If you feel in your soul that you’re a writer, feel free to call yourself a writer. I know you weren’t waiting for my permission, but I figured I’d get that out there first in case anyone starts to doubt me later. Don’t assume I’m on your side here.

Second, Brian Michael Bendis gets paid to write for a living. If you ask Brian Michael Bendis for advice on writing, his advice will come from the point of view of someone who writes for a living. He has to write every day whether his muse shows up or not. It’s like asking a computer programmer for help getting inspired because you haven’t been able to write code for six or seven years. If you go six or seven years without writing because you haven’t felt inspired, someone who writes every day for a living is not going to agree with your definition of writing. And his advice will be, “Just sit down and write.” Was he a bit of a dick because he said the guy wasn’t a writer? A bit. But it fits into the context of “writing is something you do for a paycheck.”

Third, I see a lot of professional writers get asked the same question and give the same answer. That is the answer of someone who does it for a living. It’s especially the answer of a professional writer who gets asked questions like that a lot from people who want to be a writer but for whatever reason they aren’t writing. You can see similar responses from other professional writers. If you don’t like that answer, ask someone who better embodies the style of writer you want to be for their advice.

Fourth, everyone likes to have the market cornered on being Real Writers. I got a dose of that early on when I was starting to take workshops and classes for writing SF several years ago. You have artists who look down on working writers for being sell-outs and hacks. You have working writers who look down on artists for being flaky and irresponsible. You have everyone looking down on fanfiction writers. And that’s just fiction. This doesn’t include copywriters, technical writers, biographers, etc. And these are not exclusive circles. They are overlapping circles in a Venn diagram. But the most vocal are the ones who fall into one camp and want to shit on the other. Because the world’s National Pastime is shitting on one another.

Fifth, stop shitting on each other. Seriously.

Sixth, romanticizing writing in either direction is a sucker’s game. All it does is set up a false ideal, whether it’s “writers write because they must” or “writers must be inspired to write.”

Seventh, if you want to write you should probably write whether you’re inspired or not. Books do not just magically appear. They take time. You must sit down and write things in order for them to get written. And, here’s something magical: The more you write stuff, the more your brain is conditioned into being writerly. Which then makes it easier to feel inspired. Regardless of whether you think of yourself as a writer or not: if you’re not writing you are not writing. You have inertia working against you. So go do NaNoWriMo, or find some brainstorming exercises on the internet.

Eighth, you can’t wait your whole life for something magical to happen to you. Whether it’s inspiration to write or going back to school or anything. Do you know what you get when you wait around for something magical to happen to you? Old.

Ninth, I understand that it’s hard. I spent over a decade struggling with the existential question of  ”am I still a writer if I can’t make myself write?” For some people that decade of inactivity may have been the germination of some great novel and they needed all that time to process all their life experiences into the Perfect Novel. But that wasn’t me. I had to find it within myself to sit down and write on a regular basis. Some people don’t struggle with it. Some people do. The only one that can change that is you.

 

NaNoWriMo 2013: Day 2

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

Crossed the 6K mark today. Since I’m going to lose writing days for AmberCon Northwest next week, I’ve been hoping to get 3K a day until we leave so that I’ll offset the time I’ll spend not writing. So far, so good. Here’s a taste from the work in progress.

A two tone electronic chime sounded as they stepped into the shop. It smelled musty and looked shabby. Some of the shelves had dust on the items up for sale. Further ahead Jamie spotted Sabrina talking to someone at the counter, with some lumpy brown cloth thing on the counter between them.

“Hey Sabrina!” Parker yelled. It was the tone Jamie recognized as “Parker trying to be as obnoxious as possible.”

Sabrina looked up in surprise, then her look hardened as she saw them. “What are you two doing here?”

“Costume shopping,” Parker said. “There’s a clearance sale today, y’know? What’s that you got there?”

As they drew closer, Jamie could make out a turkey head on the brown lumpy thing. Jamie could only stare in confusion.

Parker gasped. “Oh my god, is that the Turkey Tim costume? Are… are you Turkey Tim? Are you dressing in drag?”

“What are you talking about?” Jamie asked.

“At Lafayette Park, they have a thing where you can get your picture taken with Turkey Tim,” Parker explained. “Because you need to have your picture taken with someone in a creepy costume every holiday. And Turkey Tim was the one they have for Thanksgiving.” Turning her attention back to Sabrina she asked, “Does this mean you’re cross-dressing? That seems a little… I don’t know, gay, don’t you think?”

The dig on Sabrina caused Jamie to wince. She knew that Sabrina’s parents had sent to her camp to treat her for homosexuality after Sabrina had been caught making out with Parker when they were both tweens.

Sabrina stared silently at Parker for a few moments before saying, “There’s a belly dancer costume behind you.”

Parker frowned and turned to look at the costume rack behind her. “Holy crap, you’re right! This is awesome!”

“Hooray for short attention span,” Sabrina muttered. “What are you really doing here?”

“I’m costume shopping. I’m supposed to ask for Neil?” Jamie half directed that to the old woman behind the counter.

The woman nodded. “I can escort you back just as soon as I’m done helping this young lady.” To Sabrina the woman said, “Here’s your claim ticket. You can pick it up in a couple days.”

Sabrina took the ticket and turned towards the exit. On a hunch Jamie called after her, “Do you want to help me with the costume?”

Sabrina turned and looked back with narrowed eyes. Jamie couldn’t tell what the expression was supposed to mean. She couldn’t believe it when Sabrina said, “Sure” and walked back.

The old woman behind the counter began walking to the back of the store. “Right this way.”

At the back was an old coin-operated photobooth with an “Out of Order” sign hung on the curtain. Jamie looked back and noticed that Parker had not left where she was standing, but instead was dancing with the belly dancer costume and singing, “Ting-ta-ting-ting-ting!”

Jamie yelled, “Come on ‘I Dream of Jeannie’, the train’s leaving without you.”

Parker yelped in surprise, tossed the costume to the side and ran to catch up.

But what do you actually do?

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

Many years ago, I tried writing roleplaying games. I ended up quitting. But now I have a couple projects I’m poking around. So here’s some rambly thoughts on that.

The pay is awful, all told. The Science Fiction Writers of America call 5 cents a word “pro rates.” Not counting any royalties, I’d have to put out something like 3-4 novels at 5 cents a word a year to hit the federal poverty level of $11,490. When I worked for Guardians of Order on A Game of Thrones RPG and some other projects that never saw the light of day, I think I started out at 2 cents a word and reached their cap on later projects at around 4 cents a word. And then they folded and I didn’t see most of that.

Most other places at the time offered freelancers 1 cent a word or royalties-only, and there was huge competition to get that work. I don’t bring all this up as a judgment. I run a token-paying e-zine that loses money every month. I know how hard it is to make a dime. Tabletop roleplaying games go beyond “niche market.” You have to love your topic to write for that amount of pay and competition. And I just didn’t have that much love.

Similarly, I had this notion of self-publishing. This was in the early days of print-on-demand, and it wasn’t on my radar. After a lot of frustration from dealing with other freelancers, and my own motivational issues, I realized I just didn’t have the heart for that either. What I really wanted was to just tell stories. I didn’t want to design some new way to roll dice. I didn’t want to playtest systems. I barely had time to play all the games I wanted to play. I just wanted to make worlds and tell stories in them. And so the struggles to make games were just too much for me to put up with the hassle.

So I dropped it all. Just walked away. Started doing National Novel Writing Month, pumping out some short stories and shopping them around. I still haven’t made pro-rates, but overall I’ve had fun with it all. I like fiction-writer culture. I’ve not only made friends, I’ve found a spiritual family there.

Somehow, Monsterhearts changed my tune on writing games. Technically, it’s core ideas come from Apocalypse World. But I have not found the same joy in Apocalypse World that I have in Monsterhearts. I’m not sure why. It may be the genre. It may be I haven’t had enough exposure to Apocalypse World to appreciate it. Who knows?

But the Monsterhearts mechanics have this beautiful elegance that I really like, where the mechanics and the story mirror one another so well and flow easily into one another. I have a couple game ideas that I’ve tinkered with in the past, often using Amber Diceless or something else, but was never quite satisfied with the result. Monsterhearts has inspired me to re-open those ideas and try them again. And it forces me to think about the story that is created out of it. Each possible skin needs its own unique moves, and it forces me to think about what sort of story does each character lend itself to.

That’s one of the lessons I’ve learned over the years of both running games and writing fiction: Having a neat idea just isn’t enough.

That’s also as close as I come to offering writing advice.

I get lots of random ideas from dreams or that half-awake fugue state before sleep. I jot them all down as I remember them, but not all of them are viable. Sometimes when I’m particularly delighted by some dream I had, I’ll post about it on Facebook. For example:

“Last nights dream involved me dreaming that I was a member of House Stark, but somehow the Seven Kingdoms were mooshed together with the nations of Avatar: The Last Airbender and Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. [...] I think there was a bit of Exalted in there too.”

I clarified to say:

“Generally, great houses had elemental associations. Stark was Earth. The land was in ruins, husks of a previous age of glory scattered around. I was a younger unnamed Stark who had been sent with other family members to stay with a Water-based house. They had turned their backs on their old gods in favor of the Official Religion, and after many years of ignoring their former benefactors, their magitech was failing just as creatures of the ocean began to lay siege on the city. There was an arranged marriage in there too.”

I had a few people say that they’d totally play that game, that I should make a tabletop RPG of some sort out of it. Assuming that I don’t just do it as a one-shot with some crazy settings mashed together, I’d probably want to create some sort of unique setting that blends all those elements together rather than try to steal every intellectual property in there. I’ve drunk enough of the indie game Kool-Aid that I don’t want to just have some vast setting with generic rules. Those already exist in droves. The world doesn’t need another Exalted.

So, there’s my random idea. But what would the game actually be about? What sort of story is born out of this random mess from my subconscious? I tried asking a couple people, but mostly got jokes like, “Well, if it’s inspired by Game of Thrones, someone’s character has to die every session.”

The obvious common threads that I notice are:

Classic Hero’s Journey stuff. A threat to the land, one or more young heros to rise against it. Link, Cloud, Aang (and Katara and Sokka). (And, seriously, has no one built an indie game built around the Hero’s Journey?)
Living in the shadow of a previous age. There were once great wonders, but that world is gone and all that remain are ruins.
Strange and distant places to visit and explore.

So that seems all well and good. Really, that’s the set up for an excellent D&D game. (And, after I wrote the first draft of this post, I saw that someone has made an Avatar: The Last Airbender hack of Apocalypse World.)

But then the element about arranged marriages sticks out. In part because it ties into the elements in my dream that resonated with Game of Thrones and Exalted (specifically Exalted: Dragon-Blooded). In part because any time you bring an arranged marriage into a game, people avoid the arranged marriages in games like THE PLAGUE. Some games have tried to handle that mechanically. Houses of the Blooded springs instantly to mind, for better or worse. Also, I think, Pendragon has mechanical elements for marriage. I seem to recall that it tied in with the notion of “Immortality Through Your Children.” Probably some others that I’m just drawing a blank on.

And I’m not sure how that at all ties into the rest of the Hero’s Journey. Is it two separate games? Is it a second stage to the first game, where you’ve defeated the evil and found True Love and can now settle down? I just don’t know.

And then there’s the question of: Well, what is playing it like? There’s plenty of games I can poach mechanics from. Is this a game of interpersonal relations that would do well with Monsterhearts? Joe McDaldno’s Rookvale has me thinking of other things to do with Anima Prime. (Because apparently Joe makes everything look sexier to me.) I’ve also been poking around the notion of tinkering with the mechanics of Fiasco to see if you can recreate other genres by adjusting the charts, but I don’t think I want this to be a one-shot sort of game. Whatever game this ends up being.

So, seriously, what do you think my subconscious should make of this?

Monsterhearts Three Ways

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

For some people, the three-day Labor Day weekend is a last hoorah for summer. Maybe a camping trip. Maybe a day of meat. Some other horrible thing involving sunshine and the outdoors.

I spent three days shunning the evil Daystar and running Monsterhearts one-shots, collaboratively spinning yards of angsty teenage monsters and their messy lives. All in an effort to feel a bit more comfortable with the rules before I run a one-shot at Ambercon Northwest.

Yeah. I’m a huge dork.

I tossed in almost all of the skins for every day of play, the one exception being the Heir from Jackson Tegu‘s Second Skins. (I got preview editions of the skins as a Kickstarter backer. It’s a difficult skin, not suited for new players or one-shots.) This may have been too much, but I tend to like having options available.

Saturday was an all-female group and we had a Hollow, a Ghoul, and a Werewolf. One player compared it to Morning Glories. It was a sort of weird town full of secrets game, with alternate timelines and strange things in the woods. Of the three games, I think I was most satisfied with this one. We found some traction with a plot early on, and even with making it up as I went we still managed to finish a story arc in one go. This is also one that we may continue later. Because I need to run more games.

Sunday was an even split in terms of gender, and featured a Mortal (female), Ghoul (male), Unicorn (female),  and Sasquatch (male). We didn’t do the melodramatic readings. Arrivals were greatly staggered, so either people knew what they wanted to play before they showed up or they had enough time to pick something. By the time the last person showed up, there wasn’t any need to read them. I felt something was lost by not having this. There’s a beauty to the ritual of it, of bringing people together and also having them be a bit silly so they are not as self-conscious.

I fumbled around with this iteration a lot. I had trouble working in possible plots early on, then second-guessed myself a lot. So we ended up with a hodgepodge of unrelated threats and we stumbled to an end. Also difficult was that we set it in a real place rather than Anytown USA, and it was somewhere one of the players had once lived but I didn’t know much about the place. So things got a little over-specific at times, rather than fleshing out the setting as the story needed.

And, for my future reference, the Mortal really needs to have a real monster as her “Lover.” The Unicorn was just too nice. Though I’m not sure if that was a result of the skin or the player.

Monday we played with another couple at their house so that they could take care of their toddler, putting our mix at two women and one man (not including me or the toddler). Having a toddler added a different dynamic. Not bad, just a little distracting. (Unrelated, but I never realized how much I needed to hear a toddler with gamer parents say “d10″ as part of his limited vocabulary. He had one of these d10s. It was like unlocking an Achievement without realizing it was there.)

The players all portrayed female characters: Ghost, Selkie, and Witch. I tried to learn from my experiences on Sunday and had a much more coherent plot. With the coastal town in question, we ended up having a pissing match between followers of Dagon and the King in Yellow with the players trapped in between. (Team Dagon won, btw.)

My wife and I had very conflicted feelings about the Ghost as a skin. It doesn’t seem to jibe with the common mythology for them, but I’m not sure if there’s specific fiction it’s meant to emulate.

Beyond the individual games, there were some common lessons I took away from the experience.

It’s not great for one-shots. A friend had told me such, but I had to experience it to understand. For me, the hallmark of a good one-shot is having a coherent story line. And to draw a lesson from writing short fiction, you need to get to the meat of things fast.

The first session of a Monsterhearts game is meant to be for just following the characters around, getting a feel for them, throwing some problems at them and seeing what happens. There’s a lot of trying to get your feet underneath you, collaborating a lot, and not forcing any particular plan. And that can work out fine, but also has a high chance of meandering. I managed to wring out a narrative arc two out of three times, but I had to find a spot to drop a plot hook early or it didn’t seem to happen.

The other option, of course, is to use something like The Blood of Misty Harbor, which is a pre-gen mini-series using the Monsterhearts rules. I don’t know that I will use it for my run at AmberCon Northwest, but it’s a neat setup. I think what I would really like to have is a generic hook to drop in. When we had the Ghost on Monday, it worked out really well that her death was something that happened within the last few months instead of the last century. All of the PCs built their connections around this murder, and it formed a core part of the plot. Cribbing from other fiction I’ve consumed lately, there’s also tropes like a secret heritage, a new student in school (PC or NPC), or a supernatural past coming back to haunt someone (Damn you Damon Salvatore!!!).

Take note of Moves picked. When the players hand me their characters to highlight their stat, I should also note what Moves they chose for their characters. If a Ghost chooses “Hungry Ghost,” which gives the Ghost a benefit for letting people vent their sadness to the ghost, then I need to have sad people approach the Ghost. The Unicorn had a Move that allowed her to talk to animals, all Disney Princess like. I should have animals show up and just start talking to her.

Oh, and stats too. One of the things that constantly blows my mind is the way stats in the game influence personality. For those who aren’t familiar with the mechanics, most rolls are 2d6+Stat. In Monsterhearts, characters have four stats (Hot, Cold, Volatile, and Dark). Starting out they two stats at -1, two at +1, and the ability to increase one of them by 1 during character creation. 7-9 is a partial success, 10-12 is a complete success. I won’t go into probabilities, but the difference is noticeable and huge.

With the Infernal I’ve been playing in our ongoing game, he started out with -1 to Hot and Cold, which means he it is very hard for him to get his way through social means. He also isn’t great at keeping his cool. On the other hand, he’s pretty good at punching people, running away and getting visions. All of this works out well for him to be a high strung, low-impulse control monster who Knows Too Much.

In our Monday game from Labor Day Weekend, all three characters had Cold and Dark as their main stats. There was very little seduction and violence. But a whole lot of people shutting people down. A whole lot.

My take away from this is that it’s good to note what characters are good at and give them a chance to shine. And it’s also good to give them a chance to use highlighted stats, regardless of whether they are good at it, so they can gain XP. (Though, really, people seemed to have an aversion at trying to do something they are actively bad at.)

Hard Moves are hard.  One challenge I have as a GM with many RPGs is that I’m really bad at inflicting outright harm on PCs. I especially have this problem with games like Amber Diceless (and now Monsterhearts). Because ultimately it’s a decision of me as a GM deciding that you have been hurt for whatever reason I feel like. I always tend to dislike GMs who are very antagonistic towards players, and I always feel like I’m falling into that trap.

Monsterhearts has a list of what it terms “Hard Moves.” It’s specific actions the GM can take. Doing out of the blue just feels weird to me, though. You have license to bust out an extra hard Hard Move, and I feel more comfortable with that. But then there’s the question of what Move do I use? If they are attacking someone, it’s easy to find one. Like “Inflict harm.” If they’re attempting to seduce someone and bomb it, though, coming up with a suitable consequence based off the list is challenging for me. I fumble around a lot, and sometimes just opt to do nothing. So it’s something I need to think about more.

Sort of related is that I also need to get better at handling success. I have a tendency towards just giving them a clearly defined win if the dice favor them, because I don’t want to blunt the payoff of their success. But one Hard Move is “Turn their move back on them.” I’m supposed to be able to give them unintended consequences. One point where I ran into this difficulty was when a secret society was chasing after an NPC that the PCs were protecting. These were the Monday game Cold/Dark characters, so they were great at shutting people down. But then I couldn’t think of a way the secret society could continue pursuing their goal after they’d been stopped cold without negating the success. So they just grumbled and made vague threats as they left.

So I have a lot of things to mull over and consider how to do differently.

People are sometimes uncomfortable when you give them narrative power. The game has a list of Principles that you are intended to upload while being the MC. One that can be difficult to remember is “Sometimes, disclaim decision making.” I can give players power to make decisions about the setting. Sometimes this is great. When the player with the Ghoul asks me, “Do I have a pulse?” I can just say, “I don’t know, do you?” And then they feel empowered to add some flair to their character concept. “I’m thinking I do, just a really, really slow one.” Sometimes they don’t want to choose these answers. They want to interact with something outside themselves and experience the world from an unknowing point of view, and get really uncomfortable when you try to dump choices in their laps. (Or, you know, if they’ve been playing Monsterhearts with you for three days straight, they may be sick of making decisions. Ahem.)

I don’t have a good answer for this right now. I struggle with it in my conventional games. “What do you guys want to play? What do you want from the game?” “Whatever.” And then I get all emo. So, something to consider for the future.

Sometimes it’s not good to have ALL THE THINGS. I like to have tons of options for players. Want to play a sentient moss? Awesome! Let’s do this! But I think that works against me with Monsterhearts, especially in a one shot. Especially when my slot at the con will probably be only four hours. The basic book has ten skins to choose from. When you toss in Limited Edition skins and the Second Skins, that doubles the options. But when I’m running in a four hour slot, which will probably not start on time, I need to hit the ground running. The extended options are all awesome, but I don’t feel like the game loses anything by not having them for a one-shot.

A Friendly Warning About Yahoo! Content

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

Today I got a slap in the face for not being more scrupulous about third-party services and Terms of Service Agreements. I don’t have any recourse, so all I can do at this point is share my experience and hope others learn from my lesson.

First, a bit of background.

I haven’t previously posted about this, since I wasn’t sure how public I wanted to be about it, but I started up a pen-name for some side projects. I had the notion in my head that I could write paranormal romance, so I created Angela Spencer. I decided to go for it when I entered a short story contest through All Romance eBooks. I was a finalist, had my story collected into a free anthology, and that was really all the benefit I got out of it.

Since I was diving in earlier than planned with this contest, I decided to go full tilt. So I created a site for Angela, and hired a friend do an illustration of Angela. I did National Novel Writing Month as Angela instead of myself one year. For research, I started reading paranormal romance and struck on the idea of writing reviews of these books. I knew other people who made a bit of extra cash writing for Associated Content, and it was the only site like that to allow pen names. So I did that. I figured I might make a couple bucks, could establish a bit of a marketing platform for Angela, and get her name out there a little bit. On top of that I ended up writing reviews for a couple other locations.

Associated Content was bought out by Yahoo! They changed it to Yahoo! Voices/Yahoo! Contributor Network. They required all users to make a Yahoo! account.

In the end, I ended up shelving Angela. I have a hard time maintaining one writer “career” on top of a full time job, let alone two. And I had some serious discouragement early on. Since I had significantly more I wanted to do as Jeremy than as Angela, I just let the whole thing slide. I think it’s telling that the last time I posted something for Angela was right before Mad Scientist Journal started up.

Prompted by a question someone asked me, I decided to see how my Yahoo! Content was doing, since I hadn’t looked into it for a long while. I had a nasty surprise. After logging in as Angela, I had this note waiting for me.

Your Yahoo! account has been de-activated

Your Yahoo! account has been inactive for an extended period of time and is being recycled. If you need a new account, please sign up for a new one.

Well, crap. So after some ridiculous effort, because Yahoo! doesn’t want you talking to living people. I finally sent them a message that read,

My account, angelatspencer, will not let me in because I’ve been “recycled” for idleness. But the content I have on Yahoo! Voices is still up and I cannot recreate my account.

I received a reply fairly quickly, especially when you consider that I had sent it on a Saturday. Once you got rid of all the headers and footers of the thing, their reply was:

Hi Angela,

Thank you for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.

Reasons your account may have been deactivated

Deleted from within the account.

-This would require entry of a valid password.
Removed due to inactivity.

-Accounts must be signed into at least once every 12 months to prevent deletion.
A violation of the Terms of Service.

-For complete information on our policies, review the full Terms of Service.

Once an account has been deactivated, it’s impossible for Yahoo! to retrieve any stored information. You are always welcome to sign up for a new Yahoo! account.

Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Accounts Services.

Thanks,

Seed Sundae

Yahoo! Customer Care

So, this was very concerning. And not because someone claimed their name was “Seed Sundae.” In the footer of their email, it said, “We will assume your issue has been resolved if we do not hear from you within 72 hours.” But there was no clear way to respond. No link to file a response or anything. Usually these sorts of automated emails don’t allow you to reply to them. So I wrote back, hoping for the best.

If I cannot reactivate my account, then how can I access my Yahoo! Voices content? It is still up, it is presumably still generating revenue, but now you have blocked me from accessing it.

After two days I got no response, and I couldn’t find my way back through the false hopes of their “Contact Customer Care” link. (Which should really say, “Click her to be redirected to other parts of our Help menu while we pretend to help you contact Customer Care.”) On the Yahoo! Content site, there was a much more clear way to get in touch with a human. So I sent another message through there.

Hi there, My Yahoo! ID was recycled due to inactivity, which means I can no longer access any of my articles or write anything new. I tried contacting Yahoo! Customer Care, but was told that they couldn’t reactivate it. I tried reiterating my problem with the connection between my Yahoo! account and my Yahoo! Content profile, but received no further response. My incident was 130818-011508. Please, can you help?

Reasonable, right?

Welcome to The Gong Show.

Hello Angela,

Thank you for being a Yahoo! user. We appreciate you choosing to use Yahoo! as you have been.

I assure you that I will do what I can to help resolve your issue.

It is not possible to change the Yahoo! ID linked to your Yahoo! Contributor Network account – in order to continue using Yahoo! Contributor Network you will need to create a new Yahoo! Contributor Network account using a different Yahoo! ID.
Note: Any content still associated with your old account is not transferable and may remain online indefinitely in accordance with our Terms of Service.

Adding a “pen name” to your account:


If you wish, we can add a “pen name” to your account to disassociate you from your profile and content. If you would like us to do that, reply to this email with your preferred “pen name,” and we will be happy to make that change.

 If you have any further concerns regarding this issue Angela, please let me know and I will be happy to assist you.

Thanks,

Kyle

Yahoo! Customer Care

So, first off, I don’t think I’m going to be friends with Kyle. He’s not very helpful. Second, I was pretty flabbergasted. I tried not to blow up on him, because I know how much it sucks to be in customer service and having to support an unpopular policy. So I tried to provide an even-tempered but clearly unhappy response with, “This is an utterly unrealistic option. This must come up regularly, and this is the best answer you can come up with?”

I don’t know why I chose the word “unrealistic.” I think it was the most polite word I could come up with to substitute for “fucking ridiculous.” After sending that email, I glanced more closely at the Terms of Service link Kyle provided. And, yeah. Long story short, Yahoo! has a very wordy explanation of “we can do whatever we want, for no reason, and you can just live with it.” They now own the content on their site, have no obligation to remove it or pay me for it. Not that I’m probably generating any noteworthy money off of it. But it was still a rude awakening.

Unsurprisingly, my mild outrage did not crack Kyle’s flinty heart.

Hi Angela,

Thanks for spending the time to reach out to us again.

As indicated in our previous message, your only option at this point, should you wish to continue using Yahoo! Contributor Network, is to create a new account. We are not able to make exceptions for this policy. Again, should you wish, we can change the Pen Name listed in your old account to disassociate you from it.

If you have any other issues, definitely let me know.

Thanks,

Kyle

Yahoo! Customer Care

So, the best opportunity I’ve been offered is the chance to change the pen name so that the story will no longer be associated with Angela Spencer. Which is pretty ridiculous, since most of these articles were cross-posted all over the place as Angela. I didn’t give them exclusive rights, and some were explicitly reprints. I emailed them back and asked if her profile picture could at least be removed, and they did that.

I don’t have any options at this point. My main hope in getting the account reactivated was for a mythic time when I was able to try and build Angela up again. But I have no immediate plans, and I will probably never use Yahoo! for anything in the future if I do bring Angela back. I even kind of understand their policy. It’s a vast web content provider, and it is a huge logistical cost for them to their thousands and thousands (possibly millions?) of account holders. The outrage of one person with only a small handful of obscure articles on their site really has no meaning.

What I can do is share my experience, so that others can learn from my mistakes. I will not say to anyone, “Don’t work with Yahoo!” But I will certainly advise people to understand what they are getting themselves into with monolithic companies like this.

Marketing Like a Douche

Originally published at Jeremy Zimmerman. You can comment here or there.

Shilling is a crappy part of being a writer. Or publisher even, since I technically qualify as that too. I really hate doing it, and when I do shill I try to do it in respectful, non-spammy ways.

I also make no money as a writer and even less as a publisher. So there are obviously some flaws to how I market.

Still, nothing turns me off more than strangers randomly trying to mass network with me. I wouldn’t even think I was worth shmoozing, but it does happen once in a blue moon. (A friend and I were approached after we were on a panel at a tiny convention by someone who wanted to press their business card on us. I had no idea what to do.) Even my tiny little zine, Mad Scientist Journal, gets a bit of spamming from people who don’t know me but want to team up or something.

Here’s an example of something I got on my Goodreads inbox recently, with identifying information removed. He sent this the same day he sent me a friend request.

Hi Jeremy,

Its nice to meet you here on good reads.

I am on facebook, please like my author page at [redacted]

If you have a page on facebook that you want me to like in reciprocation please let me know.

I currently have two books out at the moment and a third on the way.

[Cut 200 words of descriptions for his books.]

I am looking forward to interacting with you and getting to know you better, feel free to message me anytime,

kind regards,

[redacted]

I just don’t understand the idea of going up to random strangers and asking them to spend their time doing favors for you. I hate asking friends for favors. (And, hell, if you can’t write competently in a message then I’m not going to believe your book is good.)

Or then there’s Twitter. I get followed on Twitter by people that follow 6,000+ people. Or 30,000. Or 90,000. 90% of the time they are writers with a book out, probably small-press or self-published. Most of their tweets are about their book. This isn’t someone interested in connecting. This is spamming with a veneer of civility to it.

It’s like there’s this weird notion that you can network en masse. And maybe you can. Again, it’s not like my writing has me rolling in the dough. It just seems surreal to think that the best way to succeed is to be a pest. I feel a little dodgy following people on Twitter with the hope that they’ll think I’m smart, pretty, and awesome, and will follow me back. The thought of just having some app that adds thousands of followers to your list…? Is that even reasonable?

Then you have places like LinkedIn, where writer communities will often turn into spam venues when not carefully monitored.

And this is just writers. Don’t get me started on Goodreads constantly negging me to connect my account to Facebook.

I guess there’s value in putting yourself out there. But at what point do you cease being assertive and start being an asshole? I try to market in respectful and appropriate venues, generally aiming for an opt-in model. Am I making a poor choice?

Am I being naive? Overly attached to my own romanticized concept of “good behavior”? Is this the way of the world and I’m simply choosing to not like money and success?

I’m curious to hear any thoughts y’all have on the topic.