Protagonist or Antagonist?

I was reading a forum post on the NaNoWriMo forums about villainous motives and considered my current characters and their motives.

Note, I say 'characters', not 'villains' or 'antagonists' because for my upcoming story, the antagonist is a faceless apparition of evil. I think I liked the title they gave Ganon in Ocarina of Time: "Evil Incarnation of Darkness", too much. If the monster at the end of the tunnel is just evil, has no body, no emotions, but is a concept unto itself, it makes it easier to work with.

My characters on the other hand are half villainous themselves. They have fatal flaws that color their perception of the world. Not in a ridiculous fashion but they have anger issues, are controlling, are filled with self-doubt. They're working for money, for fame, for something they cannot tell the other characters about, because doing so would admit something about themselves they find embarrassing.

In the same way I create my villains. They have families and assets they want to protect. They want to live out their lives peacefully, even if no one else will let them. In certain situations they may be aligned with the values the heroes. People can't simply be evil for the sake of being evil. That's why so many people like the concept of fantasy races, they can be truly evil unlike a human, until you remember they have to love and reproduce like any other living creature.

My villain this year is my hero, depending on what side you're on. The eldritch abomination will attempt to foster friendship between him and people who disagree with his goal, the same people who are purposed entirely with preventing his goal from coming to fruition, but mortals have free will, something the abomination doesn't understand. The characters can make their own choice to help or hinder.

-X

Review: The Doomsday Vault

I bought myself a book for my birthday. I was in the store going back and forth trying to decide which I wanted. Then I saw this one and immediately purchased it. There was no thought to it or anything, I just bought it. I was going to like this book.

The Doomsday Vault by Steven Harper takes place in an alternate steampunk timeline where a zombie plague occasionally has the opposite effect and creates mad clockwork geniuses instead of the zombies. They still die soon after, but they have plenty of time to invent a new clockwork culture.

We follow the story of two possible new recruits for a secret branch of the British government which captures the geniuses (called clockworkers) and gives them the tools to make their inventions for use by the empire.

Our female protagonist, Alice, has the more complicated position. She's traditional nobility and doesn't want to ruin her family's name any more than it already has been. Joining the organization would do that, associating with the male protagonist would do that. Technically, if she thinks, she's doing it, but none of the clockworkers have invented telepathy yet, so she's safe.

Before the end she has to make a decision of which direction to go, even though she doesn't realize that not all the decisions are in her control.

I strongly suggest you read this if you have interest in the steampunk genre. It's fast paced and fun and the internal struggles don't drag on for too long (which they could have). Also giant mecha. One's shaped like a tree.
-X

Review: Ashes of Honor

I didn't realize Ashes of Honor by Seanan McGuire was coming out in early September instead of Mid-September. It was a nice surprise and caused a lost day. It was nice.

Anyway, we rejoin our heroine as she has to prevent a changeling with too much power from accidentally destroying the world by reopening the sealed portions of Faerie. Of course it isn't as simple as that, it never is, the villain is causing arbitrary trouble that could cause terrible things to happen in San Francisco.

I shouldn't say arbitrary, it's more how the villain just doesn't care. The villain wants something to happen and needs assistance, so they make a deal. That deal has ramifications, but the villain isn't considering that, just as they aren't considering the ramifications of opening a sealed portion of Faerie even temporarily.

The most enjoyment of the book though is revisiting old character's who haven't been seen since book two, discovering some of what you expected about characters from small statements they had made, and Quentin finally getting taller than Toby.

Okay, I can't say anymore without giving spoilers (and if you look closely, I already did), so I'll just leave this with a "Go read it".
-X

That book looks old.

So I was looking at my Goodreads reading suggestions today (I'm behind on my arbitrary reading goal I set back in January and will meet my goal, just because I can) and was thinking about something I do when I look at book covers. If they have the older style of artwork and the older style of lettering, I don't give them a second look. I don't know why!

I may add, I'm skipping this series  until it's finished.

I have attempted to read some of these because I know they're popular books, but more often than not I get bored within a few hundred pages.

Do they just hit all of my nerves? I do get pissed off when I have to remember thirty names in the first two pages, worse if they're complex, or even worse, made up.

And then Peter turned to Victor, "Devereux will be made King at the equinox, unless Jun Ki can defeat him in the Challenge of Miculsuia, which is fought with nucsloia, which is just a fancy name for a sword, but I want to make it clear it's a special sword, and defeat the ilausnua."

If that paragraph appeared in a story it would be one thing, but I've run into books where they'll start off the first three chapters like that. It's just a turn off and I feel like I'm going to be working through a sea of names for the entire book.

My next guess is they are too cliché, I mean even the most traditional fantasy written today has some steampunk or magitek aspects. I get this feeling I won't see that in the older novels. They were trying to avoid the pioneers of that genre or so I assume.

It's all academic at this point anyway. I have plenty of things to read before I get to those, I just hope I'm not missing out.
-X

Having a Life

I haven't been posting as much as I once did. Moaning about how much everything sucks hasn't been as  much of an issue as it used to be, so being here isn't as important. I like to think that now I have a life, as I suggested in my last GOALS post back nearly a year ago.

Since I make those goals, I got a job. Not one that pays enough or uses my abilities enough, but a job nonetheless. I need another job or a better job. This is fact and cannot wait another day to happen. I need it now. I don't think I've made it clear my situation on this blog, but I am very, very poor. I don't want to talk about that, which is another reason I don't post here as often as I would like. Some things, like reviewing books and movies, requires me to see or read them first, and I can't go out to do that as soon as something comes out. I think I may be the only geek left that hasn't seen The Avengers yet. I waiting to see it for free.

I haven't lost weight. I lost some when I first started work, but I regained it when my hours were cut during the off-season. I am stupidly fat, possibly the fattest I have ever been. I refuse to continue to be fat.

I want to keep writing but more importantly I want to make what I have written better so that I might be able to make a profit off of it. My way of looking at hobbies is something I would be happy spending the rest of my life doing. That's why I majored in theatre instead of business. I could write for the rest of my life and I would be happy.

So here we are:

• Get a life
• Get another (better) job
• Become fit
• Exercise
• Lose weight
• Write
• edit an already written work
• write a low budget screenplay