Rick Cook Jr.'s Blog, page 21
April 5, 2014
The Recluse, the Rott, and the Runaway – Part One
So here’s what you need to know before I get started here. This is a short story broken up into three parts. There are no supernatural, science fiction, or fantasy elements. It’s a personal tale of limitation and acceptance, and of knowing when enough is just enough. It would be more comfortable at home perhaps on the Lifetime network, or perhaps one of those storieswhere the old fogey and the kid bond. Secondhand Lions, orHearts in Atlantis, maybe. Is this going to be as good as either of th...
March 12, 2014
The Nature of Narrative in Video Games
This Essay is posted in Opinion.
Disclaimer!This is completely an Opinion based upon 25 years of playing narrative-driven video games and 10 years of creative writing. Please be respectful in the comments if you disagree. Trolling and viciousness will not be tolerated.
Video Games as Narrative Devices
I don’t post about video games often, and part of the reason is that the narrative structure in video games is very often superfluous to the experience of actually playing the game, and as such it...
‘THE LAST OF US’ Should be a Movie
This essay is posted in Opinion.
Disclaimers!
1. There will be Spoilers for The Last of Us video game, you have been warned.
2. The entirety of the opinion about The Last of Us being served well as a movie is dependent on it being an adaptation of the content of the game. Since no word has yet (as of 3-12-2014) been confirmed about just what the movie would be based upon, the opinion could be rendered null and just an interesting thought experiment if they choose to tell a new, unique story in...
March 11, 2014
‘Is it Drafty in Here?’ or ‘What’s in a Draft?’
This article is posted to Page2Print.
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Last year I wrote an article about the differences between writing and editingframed through athletic activities. I’d like to talk this time more specifically about the process I use in all the various editing drafts, and why I break up editing the way I do. It’s a time-intensive process, to be sure, but it certainly is effective in producing the best possible story I am capable of producing. So strap in and don’t mind the pun.
Is it Drafty in Here?
As...
February 12, 2014
An Artist’s Legacy [430 words]
This is in response to a writing prompt over at Reddit, in /r/writingprompts. As of this posting it was the highest rated story for that particular prompt. The prompt was simply “In this world, you can instantaneously teach somebody a new skill and trade or give them a precious memory of yours, but once you give it away, you lose it yourself.”
An Artist’s Legacy
by Rick Cook Jr
I’m old and my time is coming to an end. The Department of Traded Skills has advertisements everywhere, targeted at peo...
February 6, 2014
The Terminator [1,100 words]
Fair warning, this is less a story and more a narrative. An angry, cursing, rambling, narrative about drinking and fighting. Seriously, lots of swearing. It’s also for Chuck Wendig’s Flash Fiction Challenge of the week A Drink with a Story, A Story with a Drink.
The Terminator
by Rick Cook Jr
I’ve never been able to fight, let’s just get that out of the way right now. The number of times I’ve curled up into a ball to avoid the worst of the kicks is equal to the number of times I’ve gotten into a...
January 28, 2014
Rose Petals Spinning in Space [1,040 words]
This short story is posted in Science Fiction.
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It’s time for another of Chuck Wendig’s Flash Fiction challenges, and this week’s is pretty bizarre. Fairy Tales, Remixed.
I hope you enjoy!
Rose Petals Spinning in Space
by Rick Cook Jr
She was awake for two years all by herself, running system diagnostics, maintaining the ship, checking the garden to ensure the water tubes nourished the plants and flowers. The tulips grew, but the roses never bloomed.
To amuse herself she wrote trashy romance no...
January 21, 2014
Whispering Luck [2,500 words]
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Time for another piece of fiction prompted by Chuck Wendig’s weekly Flash Fiction Challenge. This week’s is titled “The Who, The Where, and the Uh-Oh”.
Whispering Luck
by Rick Cook Jr
The day they killed me was the day Lucky Joe’s stopped being so lucky.
I could tell you the story of how I died, but let’s just say I was doing something stupid and dangerous against just pure dangerous and I lost.
But I’m still here. Locked to Lucky Joe’s, or so it wou...
January 15, 2014
Minotaur Kid’s Club [2,066 words]
This short story is posted in Fantasy.
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It’s been a hot minute since I posted anything at all, but new year and all that. Time to start fresh with a new short story response to Chuck Wendig’s Flash Fiction Challenge, Roll For Title. Twice as long as the word limit, but I really don’t adhere to that very often.
Minotaur Kid’s Club
by Rick Cook Jr.
“This is it, this time, I can feel it, guys!” Marth whispered, his voice cracking. He was in the back, by torchlight reading yet another map to the...
August 27, 2013
Forged By Fate – A Review
A Panning For Clouds first, reviewing… things! Probably mostly books!
I don’t want to turn this into a “reviews whatever is popular to get hits” blog, so I’m more likely to review things I enjoy that are lesser known, such as indie games, local authors, self-pubs, weird movies.
So let’s get to it, eh?
Forged by Fate – A Review
Book One of the ‘Fate of the Gods’ Trilogy by Amalia Dillin
Forged by Fate has an interesting premise that pits Western Religion’s Adam and Eve against...
