DID GOLDILOCKS HAVE A POINT?

I think it’s fair to say that she overstepped a great many boundaries in her casual exploration of a home that wasn’t hers, but Goldilocks maybe does show that we have to consider conditions for the best results.

I’m a sports fan and it’s not exactly a new suggestion that how many different things link together can have a huge effect on the outcome of any game or match. We see it regularly in Wales when there are international rugby matches being played in the Principality Stadium and there comes the choice of should the retractable roof of the stadium be open or closed?

If the roof is closed, the weather outside stays outside so any wind or rain which would otherwise come bundling down are taken out of the equation. If the roof is open, all the weather, good or bad, comes to play as well. If you’ve set up the way you want to play around there being very little expansive passing and running and it be more of an attritional slugfest, the chance to have the roof open and the rain pouring in is a must, but if the opposition are looking for that kind of game, then keeping the rain out could gave you that slight advantage of running the ball about.

Tennis has different court surfaces, racing reports on the state of the ground at the courses and any number of other examples of ways the activity outcome is more than just the individual are everywhere in sports but it’s everywhere else too.

Anyone need to turn the radio down when you’re parking so you can concentrate? Have you got to have a certain pillow to get the best sleep? Have you got a particular shirt you have to wear on a night out for the best ‘results’? Are you able to get work done with the radio on?

I can’t write without there being background noise.

I enjoy having music playing but I can be out and about at a coffee shop and the background hustle bustle can be enough to keep me ‘in the zone’. I suspect that it comes from the fact that since I left college, all of the jobs that I’ve had either in the fitness industry or in recruitment, meant that I was always functioning in an environment where there was loud noises going on. Add in that I used to cycle to work so grew used to the huge road noises and it just grew that I was used to being concentrated under certain circumstances.

Goldilocks tried out options until she found the one that gave her the best results and she was able to sleep with a full belly and maybe that should be something that we all embrace. If we’re doing anything, if there are modifications that could give an improved performance, shouldn’t we always be looking for them? Try things on for size and keep the stuff that works.

We’re all looking for the best way to go through each day and get the best possible outcome, even if we don’t think we are.

Here’s to the best for all of us.

Stay safe all.

WELL DONE

Those are pretty simple words, well done.

Two words. Eight letters. Easy to say. Simple.

Odd, then, that it doesn’t get said as much as it could be.

I’m creating a huge power system in ‘The Circle’ series where everyone has to deliver in their role under the very exacting eye of the people above them and I had to work hard to create this world where people at each strata in the society did their duty because they not only believed in the cause but because they have a real fear of those above them. Every day, the various different people going about their business behind the scenes within the story carry on but under the fear of what a potential failure could mean for them.

Can you imagine doing that?

You don’t hear anything positive about what you’re doing on a day to day basis, it’s just the expectation that you do what you’re paid for perfectly, and if you’re just doing what you’re supposed to be doing, why should you expect anything to be said as thanks? That then leaves you in the position of only having anything said to you if you’re less than perfect in any way.

It’s a small, but central point in The Circle books, of how an outsider recognises the life that is being led by others and tries to both fit in while also affecting change. I’ve seen similar happen in the real world so it became an interesting way of examining the human condition.

Each and every one of us knows just how good it feels to be told that we did something well, or that we’re appreciated, but it’s also something that I’m pretty sure everyone would also say that they don’t hear enough. Just being told that you did well in something is deeply gratifying far beyond just being about that specific task. It means that someone thought that you did well, like you proved your value, and chasing away any possible fears people have regarding their worth can be the very first step to helping everyone stand a little straighter and feel a bit better.

Each and every one of us does well all of the time, making some mistakes as we go but on the most part being good, but that fact so easily gets overlooked when we all just want to judge everyone.

Thanks for reading my thoughts each week, I appreciate each and every one of you.

Well done all.

IDEOLOGUES, ONE AND ALL

I’m trying to create a detailed character profile for someone in a future book at the moment and it’s something that I’ve done with everyone in my books. Making sure that I know who they are means that I can develop a consistency when I’m in the trenches of writing.

One of the things that I kept picking out that was always appearing in my planning was the idea beyond what the characters looked like and more around what they liked or disliked, what they believed in. It was never about finding the most minute detail to include, like their favourite fictional detective or if they thought the ball had REALLY crossed the line during the 1966 World Cup, it was there to help me have an idea of who they were at the very core of themselves.

In my page of information from The Circle of Fire where I made notes about one of the more central characters, I included details about their family, what was it that drove them to act the way they did? If they agree with one idea, does that follow that they must agree with the next five of that kind? It just gave me a fuller and more rounded picture of who I was writing.

Now the thing that came along with each character, nestled beside all of the above, was the line that they wouldn’t cross or the belief they had that was unshakable, and it’s that idea that made me stop and think.

Do we all have that same nugget of who we are that will just never move and we’d never entertain anything which could threaten it?

Politics is an interesting place to begin considering such an idea so let’s dive in.

Are you a red voter or blue?

Brexit or Remain?

Personally, this is an area where I’d consider myself as being the ‘floater’. I’ve voted across different parties, candidates and propositions over the years and I’ve tried to at least give everyone a chance to make their point. I’ve certainly never just remained loyal to one regardless, yet there are so many people in the world who just ignore any facts that might get in the way of what they might ‘feel’.

How do you feel about vaccines? Big Pharma?

What about QAnon?

Do you trust the BBC?

Is the Earth flat?

Now I accept that these are at the more extreme end of the continuum but we’ve all met someone who had an unshakeable belief in, if not something from above then something else, a topic which they just know about.

Ask anyone about any particular global event, wars and the like, and you’ll likely hear some very weird thoughts. The issue comes, as it would from the above collection of ideas, when that person does everything in their power to spread their viewpoint far and wide.

Previously, the world wasn’t anywhere near as connected as we are today but now, someone shouting their particular thought can pick up adherents at a remarkable rate to spread like wild fire. In no time at all, we can have that idea oozing around the planet regardless of the truth.

We all have opinions on everything and we all share and discuss stuff with others but we’re all vulnerable to the effects of something which sounds all too plausible but which is actually garbage. Every one of us has it us to be an ideologue about any given topic so it really falls to each and every one of us to be sure we’re saying the right things but at the barest, we should be asking ‘Are you sure?’

Stay safe all.

Also, the Moon isn’t real, and anyone who tells you different is clearly trying to hide something!

CAN’T KEEP ON GROWING

I’ve almost finished my latest WIP so it shouldn’t be too long before I can get it published and then turn my attention back to my original series and start work on book four of ‘The Circle’ series. My current WIP is a departure from the world of dragons and magic so it became a little bit of a palette cleanser for my brain, though it’ll be good fun to get back into it again.

Over the weekend I attended a signing event where I was asked, with a conspiratorial wink, if there were going to be any more books beyond the five I’ve originally planned and my original answer of ‘No’ made me consider the idea a little more.

If the mood really grabbed me, I suspect that I could probably write a prequal series which explores how the original adventures of the organisations and groups involved unfolded. I could add, then, an origin story book for certain characters who have alluded to events from their past or who we don’t know enough about, and I suspect that if a had to, I could add in a sequel set of books, but if (SPOILERS) owns (SPOILERS) with three (SPOILERS) then (SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS).

You get the picture though.

There are still piles of books that I could drag out of the back of my brain if the call was there but it leads me to consider if further expansion would be worth while.

I’ve mentioned in different posts on here over the years that I’m a big fan of both Star Wars and Star Trek and seeing how these franchises have continued to grow over the years has clearly shown that huge universes filled with different characters have enormous scope to keep on telling swathes of different tales. Adventures which happen ‘off the page’ can be brought to life and open any number of doors to possible storytelling.

The Clone Wars were mentioned in the first Star Wars film but much later on, were opened up to be explored because there’s lots that would have taken place there for characters both new and old. Star Trek has dealt with new time periods and ships but also by exploring characters individual exploits as they’ve aged. They’ve gripped tightly to the Federation and how those rules within bring about positives and negatives as the human race marches into the future.

But just because those franchises have done it, doesn’t mean that every other one can. Critical mass appears at different points for different stories.

The criticism has been levelled at both Star Wars and Star Trek but also Marvel, Harry Potter and others, that possibly they’re reaching a point where they can’t squeeze any more life out of their topics, regardless of how hard they twist. It’s understandable that if a particular ‘brand’ or collection of stories is very well received that making more and more of it can only be a positive thing. Fans call out for more of the thing they like so get more and more out there. The problem comes when you push too hard and flood the market.

You keep diving through the ranks to tell more and more tales for characters or time periods that fewer and fewer people recognise until it feels more like you’re shoe horning a brand into an existing story and hoping no-one notices.

Later Hellraiser films suffered from this as Pinhead and the whole lore was kind of tacked onto a film and it could then benefit from the strength of the name Hellraiser despite it not really being a Hellraiser story.

More than anything, whatever choices are being made in the creation of a piece of work, it has to be built on the strong foundations of a good story. If I was to try and bang out a huge number of extra materials around the central tale I’d have to make sure that I was giving the story the treatment it needs and not end up writing as if I were photocopying a photocopy over and over again and letting the quality drop.

Every character in every story explores and experiences things in their own way so there can always be something to say, but knowing that there are still stories there and making them worth reading can become two very different things. As long as what is being created is still of the level, great stuff, but keeping going just for the sake of it can’t be good.

I think I’ll stick to my five books for ‘The Circle’ series and get out on a high as the series comes to the expected conclusion I’ve planned and just leave it there rather than risk sullying it with extras people don’t really want.

Or will I?????

Stay safe all.

CAN’T SEE THE WOOD FOR THE TREES

Have you ever done something, as a way to just act as a place holder, but then when the time comes to get back to the task, you just get stuck?

I’ve done it, and I’m stuck.

The book I’m currently writing isn’t a part of The Circle series. I’ve had the idea for years and it started it’s life as a short story that was going to include in my first book of short stories, Tall Tales for Dark Nights. As I worked on it, the word count grew and grew until it was clear that the story was just too big so I set it aside while I worked on my novels and the other short stories I’ve put together, fully intending to dive back in at some point in the future, and with that in mind I saved the file and off I went.

The problem was though, what should I call this story?

I hadn’t finished the story.

I hadn’t fleshed out the characters.

I hadn’t even fully decided on what would actually happen at the end of the book.

I think it’s fair to say that with all of that still outstanding, there was a real question mark over what the title should be.

When I came up with the title of my first book, The Circle of Fire, it made sense not only as a stand alone novel but as a part of the remaining series that I had in mind so I was able to settle on the title pretty early on. With my current WIP, I made, what I thought was, a good move and gave the story a place holder title which had been growing on me as I’d written the short story. And in doing so, I planted a land mine for future me to deal with.

Future me is now present me, and I hate past me.

I know the working title is nothing more than a temporary label but for the life of me, I just can’t seem to get past it to sort out a new title.

I’ve got the book mapped out fully, I’m making pretty good headway to finishing it, and yet, when I even slightly consider the appropriate title, that bloody place holder just looms back at me, utterly obscuring everything else. It’s like someone telling you NOT to think of a green elephant so that’s all that you can picture.

I’m not at the point yet of just slamming my fists down on the desk and screaming about the pain and suffering of it all but as I close in on the back end of the process, knowing that I still need a title is starting to mock me a little. I’m not going to force the issue while I keep on writing because I’ve got to trust the process I work with. I know when the title comes along that I’ll grab it and everything will seem so daft, I was getting worried for nothing etc.

The biggest takeaway, though, is making sure that I don’t make things more awkward than they need to be in the future by setting up my own blocks.

Stay safe all.

CARE MORE?

Last week, I discussed monsters.

It wasn’t a way to look at those evil creatures that are out there coming to eat us in the night while they breathe fire and destroy cities, I was more interested in how the monster exists on both sides of the fighting in stories, and that ‘our’ monsters are the ones who do the most brutal things but do it by way of protection of society. I used the SAS as an example.

This week I want to consider those monsters again but this time, how they’re all too often seen as a necessary evil but nothing that ‘polite society’ wants to admit to or acknowledge.

We can accept that there are dirty jobs that need to be completed for the good of the whole and that those jobs are going to make the people who do them dirty as well, but are we willing to help clean them when their work is done?

There are stories out there which deal with the idea of very often military people being conveniently forgotten when the dirty job they were performing was no longer well viewed and this turns into a revenge motive for the antagonist or the like. If you’ve seen the film The Rock you’ll be familiar with the idea. Awful deeds needed to be done for the good of the whole and then the people who did what had to be done were forgotten about.

A real life example comes from the members of Bomber Command during the Second World War.

This was dirty work which got everyone involved very, very, dirty.

Come the end of the war, Bomber Command was missing from speeches by Churchill et al as there became the feeling that the Allies had done terrible things via Bomber Command so maybe they shouldn’t be celebrated in the same way. The leaders had been happy to send the monsters out, but admitting to them became a step too far.

We hear stories today of veterans being denied the support they need after they’ve left service, of struggles due to massive injuries, of the mental suffering of those who may have seen some of the most shattering things imaginable because they were doing the dirty work, they were our monsters because we needed them to be.

Now I’m not aiming for a ‘bang the drum, yay the military’ kind of post but it’s important to remember that, much like the swan’s legs, there are things happening all the time that we don’t have any knowledge of that keep everything above the surface looking serene. There are people out there in the dark who make sure that the dirty work gets completed so no-one else has to do it and I think that recognition needs to be spread about.

I’m writing a series of books which has mansions filled with staff members who have to do everything to keep the place going and it’s all too easy to see them as faceless nobodies. I made sure to address this very point and show a change to accept everyone rather than just those at the top.

We’re all in this together you know so we need to look after everyone we can.

Stay safe all.

WORTH HOW MUCH?

It’s something that I’ve used in my books as a way to create hierarchical structure and therefore the framework that a society can be built on but does a title become more powerful than the person who carries it?

In The Circle books, there are characters who go by their station or role in the world rather than by their names. The Mage, The Elder, The Messenger, all occupy what would be called high office in the story but we haven’t yet been given any of their real names. They’re all very powerful in their own right but is it the badge that gives them the power or does it come from them intrinsically?

The UK has seen a change in monarch for the first time in years but the enormous power that can be wielded by the King or Queen isn’t built on any specific personal qualities beyond being the next in line. As Prince of Wales, Charles would have been able to do some things but not others but now he’s in the hot seat, he can all of the things that previously only his mother did. Looking at things like that, anyone could be under that crown and do the same.

We recognise this fact easily because we don’t bow and scrape with everyone we meet but shouldn’t we ask ourselves about the reasoning behind the worth we place on people or roles?

If we’re looking up and are running around in a panic, the person we’re reacting to can most likely fire us or make our life uncomfortable. Who’s worked in a company that had the top brass come round on visits to see how everyone was getting on and have meetings with heads of departments etc? Where everyone would be doing their very best to make sure the place looked great and everyone was doing what they were supposed to and everyone was happy? They must have thought every site they visited just naturally smelt of fresh paint.

It was the mantle of the person which would cause the stress.

Everyone on edge because one foot out of place would mean a fate worse than death.

Ish.

But if you look the other way, if you only see the value of a person coming from what it is they can give you, there’s another issue. People can be corrupted by always being surrounded by bowers and scrapers and start to believe the metaphorical hype.

If we all have intrinsic value, the mantle of office should never lead to its wearer to treat anyone with less dignity, but this imbalance doesn’t have to remain just with highly elevated people. Have you only been spoken to when someone needs something from you? Have you seen an imbalance in relationships?

I’ve created the characters I have and the society I have to help create a subtle level of tension in my books that’s always just there on every page to constantly be a small obstacle everyone could trip over at any point because risk comes from more than just the evil monsters. I also want to just suggest that people at every level are dealing with their own specific issues, very often being driven by their own position, so maybe we all just look at the person across from us as a human to start with.

Stay safe fellow humans.

WHAT YOU CAN’T SEE

Who likes magic?

I’m not talking about the stuff of literature where Gandalf slings spells about, rather the real world version of the stuff, prestidigitation.

Magic acts are all built on the idea of misdirection in some way or another. The view of the ‘trick’ from the outside is the stuff of world shattering power but that only works because you can’t see the mechanics of how all the different parts fit together. As soon as you can see how it works, not quite so fantastical

The Wizard of Oz is this personified. Awe inspiring power but once you see behind the curtain, not quite so much.

But magic isn’t just that which is maintained by perspective.

Any number of conspiracy theories are built on the idea that we can’t see the full way that actions are taking place so there must be a shadowy cheat being used against us, that there are different groups who are actually controlling the world but that they remain hidden from sight by the sleight of hand of how things are put together.

So why are we so ready to create narratives that suggest that everything is rigged against us?

If our lives aren’t heading in the direction that we feel that they should, and if we can’t see why that could be happening, a mystery cabal doing the work that will squash millions can be a very compelling idea. We can be reassured that any issues that are getting in our way are the result of outside forces rather than just being ‘life’ and I think that these things are more simple than just excusing potential short comings in our lives.

In my novels, The Circle Series, I have my main character land in a world that he’s not aware of or prepared for as he learns that a great many of the truths that he has built his life on are in fact false. There are shadowy groups who exist outside of the ‘real’ world who have been at war for millennia over the fate of the human race but they do everything they can to keep hidden behind secrecy and confusion. I liked the idea of creating a world where you have to completely re-evaluate the way you view the truths around you and then turning those truths on their heads.

We devour media which has that at the core of how it goes about it’s business. Speculative fiction about past civilisations, life in outer space, the nature of the universe, even whodunnits, are us taking a journey through our own ignorance towards knowledge. We do the same thing for everything that we’re presented with, not just stories so if we don’t fully understand how certain aspects of the world work, we can create a plausible fantasy based on the limited detail we may have.

I used to work in an Amazon site in South Wales and if you’d asked me how they were able to get things delivered to our homes so quickly before I walked in the place, my answer could well have been “Magic”. I had no frame of reference so I could have had a bit of a guess, and I may even have had some bits right, but I’d have been miles away. I learned more and things became clearer that my original idea was way off.

We are, now more than ever, seeing a more and more targeted world through the media we consume. Algorithms work to help us see more and more of the things we’ve seen already and news is being delivered with such a partisan slant on things that we are manipulated to have our wrong ideas built upon and reinforced. Over and over, we see those conspiracy theories played out and we just keep on keeping on. None of us can break free of the control from the algorithms as we search for our answers.

It’s like they’re the power out there manipulating us.

We’re all looking for understanding and answers so we can best move through the world and when we don’t know, we can fill in the blanks ourselves. Those blanks that we fill in then get built on again and again and it’s because we know that there are things going on that we don’t see / understand, it can be really simple to end up in the wrong place.

We all know that there are processes in the world at every level that we don’t know about, because no-one knows everything about everything, but knowing that we have those blank spots out there and then filling them with made up rubbish is what leads us all away from a collective good and closer to trauma for a great many people.

Stay safe all.

OFF THE PAGE

I’ve been doing some work on my latest WIP and it’s become an interesting little point that I’ve stumbled over. You can tell a great story without telling it all. Events can happen off the page yet still carry weight to have a massive effect on the story as a whole.

I’m not thinking about the fact that events finish at the end of a chapter and then the next one starts a week later with nothing to add to the overall narrative, it’s when that which happens between one line and the next is important but the suggestion of those events is more valuable.

I used a basic example of this in my novels where on one occasion, there was a sex scene and in another there was an hours long training session.

The events that took place were important to the overall story but if I’d have lingered on them for too long, exploring every single possible detail, it would have weighed the pace of the story down. We knew what was happening and the significance of what was going on was clear, but looking at all of it didn’t help things.

We’re all familiar with the phrase ‘read between the lines’ and it’s that element of understanding a story by what isn’t being said which expands the tale.

Leaving things to happen off the page isn’t the only way that this can be brought to bare.

I wanted to frame the start of The Circle of Stars against what had happened in The Circle of Fire and as such, the opening couple of pages recount an almost identical situation, with the same descriptions appearing word for word. I wanted to show how the mindset and potential wider view of things had changed for the main character due to the events of the previous books in the series. The same situation is presented but seeing the differences later on gives absolute clarity to the idea that the everything that has been going on is having an impact.

The message and meaning is there front and centre without the need to actually say anything.

Using subtext and repetition of information flavours the story in ways that just straight up describing everything just isn’t capable of. That subtlety can mean a way that characters become more accessible to the reader and then feel more real.

I’m going to always do my best to explore all the ways to make my writing as interesting and compelling as I can and if that continues to mean that I have to not only consider what I do write but also what I don’t, I’m all over it.

Maybe that can mean that if I don’t write anything on a given day, I’ve still written really?

Stay safe all.

WHY NOT TRY?

It has been suggested that ‘Everyone has a book in them’.

That may be true, though for most I suspect they’d have to do a fair amount of digging to free it.

I say this not to gloat that I managed to reach my own, rather to say why can’t we achieve these things?

I watched a fragment of a program on TV today called Money for Nothing where items which are about to be thrown away are ‘rescued’, handed over to a particular expert who then breathes new life into them, and are then sold with any profit going back to the original owner. All in all, pretty middle of the road afternoon TV but there’ve been times when I’ve looked at the finished product that’s been sold for hundreds of pounds and been at an absolute loss to explain the appeal. In short, ‘I could do that’.

Now I recognise that this is a horribly simplified way of looking at things and becoming an expert in any field isn’t as simple as just having a bash and getting positive results but at the very centre of this idea is why not give it a go?

We always seem to find ways for things to get in the way of possibly having a crack at these potential hobbies.

I’ve heard at different events where people have lamented the fact that they’d be able to write a book if only they could find the time, find the energy, find the motivation. My wife has been told quite often by people that they’d love to be able to crochet the way she does but …….(insert reason).

I’ve done the same myself, we all have. We get an idea in our heads of trying something new and then talk ourselves out of it. What if it doesn’t work out? What if I’m no good? What if I make a fool of myself? Probably better not to risk it.

Rubbish.

We need to be more willing to just go for it.

Just not giving things a go could very well be keeping us from doing something amazing that we deeply enjoy, and if we’re not taking the chance because we may not get the ‘perfect’ outcome, we can be sure that “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”

Have a go and enjoy it all.

Stay safe all.