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I keep several short stories going so I have something to turn to when I need a break from working on a book. I was working on such a story this evening when a depressing thought struck me. The world these stories take place in no longer exists. And I'm not sure if it comes back. Most of my stories take place in the "now". But the "now" in the stories I've started, including the book I'm working on is no longer reality. So why am I bothering?
Melanie
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People want to feel good
There is so much doom and gloom around in the world today so anything that can lift the spirits of your readers is sorely needed.
That good enough?
Samantha
I was thinking something similar earlier today, too.
But I think the recognizable world will return. For me the world that is gone and ain't coming back was the one that existed before Facebook, iPhones, and email. I set a lot of my stories in the 80s or earlier because I really do not know how young people use this new tech.
But it happens. Television destroyed the world of radio drama and going to the burlesque now and then, just as radio had destroyed what burlesque and music halls had been before they changed to survive radio and cinema.
The pandemic of 1918 changed the world but the world remained the same, also, or at least as much as it ever can.
My grandfathers were born in 1888 and 1890 in a rural area where it was an hour's ride (on a horse or in a buggy) to see a train track or a telegraph pole. They both lived to see people land on the moon and the first space stations go up. You didn't want to play checkers or gin rummy with either of them, that was their internet that they were expert in. :)
How many times did the world change for them?
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Today's world
Rather than looking at change, think about, as Erin wrote, how the world has developed since the beginning of the 20th Century and the oppportunities that those developments might offer.
A complete re-write on twelve books!
Grrrrrr...
I have at least twelve books on the go that are set in the here and now so may have to rewrite if I want to keep the degree of realism my muse demands.
Basically, what has happened in real life changes my books beyond all recognition due to this bloody virus.
Now, do I put them on hold and then continue if and when this damn thing passes, or do I soldier on regardless?
I am tempted to do the former and wait and see... I do have some sci-fi and fantasy books that I can work on... like Knox Book three and the latest Curse of Shalamar, as well as some others. I was speeding along on Torc 3 but as it is set in the here and now... I'm scuppered.
I do believe that if you write a realistic novel, it has to reflect the times we are living in - good and bad. Ten years down the line, someone might pick up the book and wonder why one disregarded one of the most significant events in human history.
One can literally rewrite the rules for sci-fi and fantasy, where your universe is how you want it to be. As I do many historical books one has to (more or less) keep within the lines of realism as well.
One cannot deny that this virus pandemic will be a big, black splodge in our great grandchildren's history books, so our stores, if truly contemporary, should reflect how it was.
Tanya
There's no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes!
What the heck, who'll able to tell?
If your "here and now" is pre-Covid then you might as well continue! If you don't mention dates, no-one will notice any anachronisms. You are, after all writing fiction so it does NOT HAVE TO match reality perfectly.
Best wishes
Dave
The world will be different PC
PC as in Post Coronavirus.
There are ways to skip a few months or a year in a story but yes for many writers it is going to be a big problem.
In the story that I'm writing right now, will have the timespan of its last few parts condensed so that it concludes before Christmas 2019.
We we eventually come out the other side of this thing, we (or those of us that survive that is) will have the benefit of hindsight to look back at this time and craft our tales accordingly.
Samantha
Another Knox sequel?
No, no, don't do that one next. If that one comes out so soon after your last two books I'm liable to die of sheer happiness and then I won't get to enjoy your other not-yet-published books.
Love ya Tanya. (Well, your books at least. I'm just making assumptions about how awesome you are.)
Time move forward...
Those stories are set before this covid-19 thing, so it is normal they don't talk about in the time line. But at the end, you could let it know that a great darkness is coming.
In a couple of years, most life will have resume as normal as possible. So some references to that great death could be made, but show us that life continue.
Whatever the way you go, I hope to be still able to read the tales you spin for I quite enjoy them.
Big Peaceful Hugs tmf
Change????
We've been watching a lot of movies. Last night we watch "Harriet."
Rather than being startled by how much the world has changed since the 1850s -- I had the exact opposite reaction.
We're still living in a world of bigoted justice, inequality of income and opportunity, and divisive politicians. I have no doubt that our current group of scum would pass the Fugitive Slave Act if there was money in it for them personally.
The Greeks wrote all the good stories and we've been stealing their ideas since. Their stories are based on the hubris of man, which never changes.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Ναί
Love, Andrea Lena
Two thoughts Hon.......
First, your writing brings joy to many people - myself included. We depend on you and others with your talent to bring a little sunshine to our days.
Second, as the saying goes, this too shall pass. Although this is currently a crisis - and trust me, I know as I am sitting quarantined in my own home as my spouse was exposed at work. plus I am in upstate NY about 20 miles north of Albany, or three hours outside of NY City. Not to mention the fact that my employer is a retail company and we are shut down until at least the end of April, but at least we have enough liquid capital to weather this - unlike many other companies.
Even knowing all of that, this too shall pass. As a people, we are resilient. We will adapt and overcome. This will eventually be nothing more than a blip in history - a bad story to remember, but like the Spanish Influenza outbreak some 100 years ago, it will eventually become nothing more than a memory. Hopefully one we learn from, but a memory none the less.
Look at HIV - it could have been the end of the LGBT community and culture - but it wasn’t. We learned, we adapted, we got smarter.
This too shall pass - and we will still need you and your talent.
Love ya’ Hon!
From quarantine,
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Just about everything written in the 'now' will get dated.
Just about everything written in the 'now' will get dated.
Readers will make allowances.
Sherlock Holmes today would travel by car, airplane, etc. Not horse-drawn taxis and railways. Dr Watson would use antibiotics, and record Holmes' adventures on his laptop.
Just about all of modern physics says that H. G. Well's Time Machine can't exist. Oh, and the Standard Model - the best we have for how the Universe works - is subject to revision...
We can't do what Dr Frankenstein did, except for one or a few organs at a time.
Jules Verne's "Big Gun" to get people From The Earth to the Moon, might, best case, liquefy all aboard.
Some authors do correctly predict the future: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_C._Clarke proposed geosynchronous communications satellites in 1945. Twelve years before Sputnik-I, the first orbiter.
Here's the thing:
>> It's the story, it's not the technology, it's not the current events <<
We read the stories because they are good stories, and not because the author succeeds as an Omniscient (Pop Culture) Historian. The Epic of Gilgamesh is still in print after ~4,100 years - 41 centuries!
Trying to endlessly update a story to keep it in the 'now'... you'll go mad, and you, and we, will lose all your other good stories you could have written instead.
If you must, begin a story in the 'now'. As events come in, your characters react to them, chapter by chapter. Leave the content of the earlier chapters alone.
Sigh
Well, I went ahead and started working on my novel and a short story again and just continue on. Though I don't think I'll end my Texas Belles sequel with "The audience applauded wildly when we finished our last song during our outdoor concert. From the back someone shouted, "I love you Ayumi!" I laughed, but then I felt a sudden chill on my soul. My eyes focused on the distant horizon. There's a storm coming..."
You can’t worry about that.......
During the Great Depression, one of the things that got people through the day was the wonderfully over the top movies - especially the musicals - that were coming out of Hollywood.
People need an escape - they need something to remind them of what they are living for, of what they are going through all the quarantines and social distancing for. They need you to write something that will help ground them in what life should be, and in why we are putting up with everything now.
Don’t take that away from us by being down.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
If you can, I hope you continue
About a year ago, I happened to find my very first TG story. As I remembered, it was a pretty good idea, so I thought I'd clean it up and post it here. As soon as I read it through, I saw a huge difficulty: all of the dramatic tension at the end of story was due to the inability of the two main teenage characters to talk to each other. They were far apart and didn't know where each other were. That would be pretty unlikely today: all the kids in the story would have cell phones. A lot of steps in the story just fell apart.
I'm sure there's some way to rework it in the cell phone age. I haven't bothered yet, though.
On another tack, I don't know whether you're old enough to remember the sixties. There was a great fear of atomic annihilation and environmental disaster. Many people didn't have children because they thought, How can I bring a child into a world like this? That doesn't seem so odd today, but a year ago it would have sounded pretty weird.
Today I had a video chat with my daughter, who is in her early twenties. Her job and her social life recently disappeared because of what's going on. When I talked with her, I was realistic about the way things are. I didn't lie or say, "Everything's going to be alright."
But... I did make her laugh a few times. I made her smile a few times. I let her know I cared. I encouraged her to exercise and find things she likes to do.
What else is there to do?
One of my favorite quotes is from Robert Ingersoll, the famous atheist, who said, "The best way to be happy is to make others so."
You write great stories. I've loved everything you've written. If things work out badly for me and mine, I'm sure I'll go back and read some of your pieces to take my mind somewhere else.
If you can, I hope you keep writing.
- io