Robert C. Day's Blog, page 27

Strangers – Final Phase before Writing

Three and a half thousand words down the line and I’m ready to give up on this mapping-the-plot, sketching-the-characters, asking-for-feedback, revising-accordingly bullshit and just get on with writing the piece already (like what I normally do)!

Okay, so you know the background (for my nextstory)from my previous pieces (see below). The premise is thus:Harry (56 yearold tramp)swaps bodies with Daisy (15 year old schoolgirl). Before I start writing I just need to know this: should I give it...

Concept – Daisy & Harry have Chips

I wrote a basic plot outline, added character sketches for Daisy and Harry, and now, after much deliberation,I’m ready to talk about the concept I have in mind for this story.

This wasn’t such an easy thing to come up with because Harry and Daisy are such different people and their lives do not interact at all. They have no shared likes or activities and even if they were the last people alive (a scenario I did consider) they would probablystill not get on. So why did I make this so difficul...

Cut Out the Middle Man

…and flush your sandwiches straight down the toilet.

(sorry)

Green Planet Plans

Walking through town and I saw this bike with a box mounted on it that said (something like) Green Couriers and I thought “yeah, that’s a good idea, a country-wide network of cyclists that deliver packages”. I mean, there are plenty of people sitting around doing nothing and so it’d be better to use their energy for a good purpose, right?

Then I found myself wondering if the electricity contained in their body could he extracted more efficiently. Anyone know how much power can be got from you...

Character Sketch – Harry Bone

Harry Bone (aka Boner, Bonio orBone Dog) usually replies, if asked, that he was born on April the 1st 1960, which would make him 56 years old. He looks much older. His weight is 147 pounds and his height is five foot seven inches. What hair he has would be the colour of new steel if he were to ever wash it and, aside from what is hidden under a Benny Hat, hangs in greasy clumps about his heavily bearded face. He had never needed glasses, his vision being miraculously 20/20. He has a pronounce...

Go with God

I assure you that not everything is shutting down – some things open and some things close – that is the nature of the cyclical world we live in. Similarly, some lights are getting dimmer and others are getting brighter. There is no negativity without positivity – they are simply opposites – the presence of one indicates the presence of the other.

Hope is a different kind of beast. Anyone watching the world and the multiplicity of woes can easily lose hope, but if we watch the light within –...

Character Sketch – Daisy

Daisy Facey aka Daisy Face was born 21st June2001 and is 15yrs old. She is 5ft 6in tall and weighs 123 pounds. Her hair is blondebut looks like burnished gold and it falls to her mid-back in waves. Her distinctively light-blue eyes are slightly longsighted but shedoes not wear corrective lenses. She intends to get her eyes lasered and her boobs (34A) enlarged as soon as she can get her own money. She has relatively short legs and a long body but dresses to hide this, typically steering away f...

Choose

Imagine for a moment that you live in an environment of pure energy.
Imagine this energy as willing to allow you to choose your own future.
Imagine you said ‘you choose instead’.

Planning Ahead

Okay, peeps – here are the steps I will take to write my next (2,500-word) story:

Write 2 comprehensive character sketches incorporating personality and physicality Insert character one (C1) into a difficult situation and watch how personality and difficult interact Explain a bit about how C1 got into that fix – just enough detail, but not too much Push character two (C2) into C1’s face to make the situation worse Clearly show what C1 needs to do to make things better Pit C2 against C1 and s...

Coming Now Gone

I will dress you up and take you down to the edge of time, and the dream we share will occupy our thoughts in the parks and on the beaches of the worldso that passing people will smile and tell us we were always meant to be together. Soft will be the night in which silk sheets slip sensuously from you to rest below our moving forms. On the cusp of a new day, we will celebrate the rising of the sun and the setting of the moon, framed carefully by the open window. The startling sweep of the for...