Happily Writing

Due to my change in career focus (These days I'm a writer, or trying to be), I've created a new blog called Happily Writing at: http://michaelhappilywriting.blogspot.co.il/. If you're interested, I'm regularly posting over there. Thanks for tuning in!

My first book

Final Result - Pretty Proud of Myself

I've managed to finish the story by 2:30 AM. I had a general feeling that I did good, though it was a spelling mistake minefield.

My daughter thinks that 5:15 AM is a damn fine hour to wake up, which would make her a wonderful farmer, or rooster. However, as a daughter, this feature could improve. I walked around all day yesterday with a headache and dizziness. Got home yesterday, and went straight to bed... Ha!

Nope, not even close. Got home yesterday, made sure my kids eat, bathed my daughter, made sure my son does his bath, put them both to sleep, walked the dogs. Then I was free to spell-check the story and eat dinner. After that I decided to pass on our nightly Friday Night Lights episode, and went to bed. Instant sleep.

I gave the story to my in-home editor, and she said it's pretty good except for all the things that are not (read - about a third of what's in it). She gave me a list of corrections to implement this evening, after which I'll submit the story with a day to spare.

Surprisingly Good and Fun

So this story is turning out to be surprisingly good! (Or maybe it's the whiskey/coffee combination). I have some interesting politics in there. I have fantastic dialogues. I... I am happy!

I just introduced the "disconnected", a group akin to the Amish. They decided to completely disconnect themselves from the internet. They have no religious agenda, and they have no problem with using modern equipment as long as it doesn't need internet.

My young cop hates them.

Oh, right, and they had a murder there, so our fantastic duo is there to investigate. But no social network, so our young cop is out of his element. See what I did there? In a disgustingly predictable plot twist, the old cop will save the day.

But it's written really good. Don't judge me.

Phase One - Premise

Okay, Phase one done, I've layed out the premise. The two cops were introduced. The young cop solved a case in a couple of minutes by browsing the social networks, as the older cop just stared at him helplessly.

Then I've sent them home to introduce two other concepts for this story. One was microcopters - according to my story, in the near future, most people will have microcopters flying around them, filming their every move, so that memorable moments can be uploaded later to the social networks. The older cop is walking home, annoyed by the constant humming of the microcopters, remembering a better time.

The second concept is a sad and depraved psychological effect. Due to the extreme exposure of people in the social network, and the availability of virtual reality, a person can experience  intimate moments of someone else. Specifically, the moments of your ex's new partner. This is a tricky part to write, because I'm not sure how dirty I should get in this story. I am uncertain about the judges, and what they intend to do with the story. Ideally, this would get deep into NSFW territory, simply because the impact is stronger then. I aim to show the cheapness of sex, and there's no better way then to treat it casually and with disdain - sex shared socially for upvotes. However, I watered it down a bit, to make it more accessible. It's worth mentioning that all the books I wrote were intended for ages 12-16. Anyway, my young cop goes back home and expriences having sex with his ex through her new partner's eyes. It's a sad and depressing scene.

At this point I have 1,400 words. I'm limited to 5,000, but I think that's fine. I'm betting on about 4,500 words total, meaning I have third of the story done. It's 11:17, whcih for a parent of three kids means pretty much the middle of the night. I drank one cup of coffee, and I am considering to drink a small glass of whiskey later.

Let the good work resume!

Character's Background

So, I'm not exactly new to this whole writing thing. I've published three books, and wrote three more that never saw daylight. However, I've lately started to do something new when I write. I start with the character's background.

Each character added gets some background. A minor character will get a paragraph. An important character will get 200-300 words. The point is, it gives me some feel for the character. It also prevents idiotic mistakes like having all major characters in the book be single children with no siblings. This happened in my last book, and I had to change it after the book was written, because it made no sense.

So I'm starting with two cops. This is a sci-fi story in the near future. The near future is swamped with social networks. They intersect, fill every little pore of your life, and privacy is a thing of the past. The first cop is a young and rising star. His control and expertise in the various social media outlets assist him in cracking case after case. However, his girlfriend just left him after meeting another man in a network called "My point of view" (or POV for short). Those of you who have some basic shady internet knowledge can probably guess the nature of this social network.

The second cop is an old cop. He and his wife separated during a time named "the privacy crisis". During the crisis in which pretty much everything was exposed, he found out she was having two virtual affairs and one physical. They divorced, she took the children with her and he moved to a different city. Failing to follow the influx of various social networks, he became slowly outdated, and is concidered a failure in the precint.

And there you have it. The actual background I made for them is much thicker. but I just wanted the gist of it here.

By the way, my previous post had the word "seriously" in it at least three times. I figured it out while I was making dinner for the kids. I'm going to be writing this blog fast, and will read each post only once after I'm done (which is unusual for me). I'll live with the terrible errors of repeating words and spelling mistakes, or this blog will be dropped in a couple of days.

Short Story All Nighter

Huh. So some time has past since I last updated this blog. What was the last post. The Mac? Seriously? Where is that thing, anyway? Oh, there it is. With an interesting layer of dust over it. Seriously, I should by cheaper paperweights from now on.

Yeah, so I've wanted to come back to this blog for a while. Some things have happened. Two kids born. Plan to start another game company failed due to lack of moral. Started to work again. Wrote a book. Published a book. It's a nice YA book. Readers love it. Perhaps more about that later.

So generally, I'm trying to be a writer now. I've got some nice writing projects going on. Perhaps more about them later. Seriously, blog. It's hard to catch up two and a half years, isn't it?

But here's a good place to start. I need to write a short story for a contest. The thing is, I found out about it a bit late. Like... three days before submission late. So I decided to do the responsible grown up thing, and simply not go to sleep until it's done. Oh, and while we're doing something stupid, let's procrastinate by writing a blog while doing just that.

So I'll post some posts during the night, because stupidity is fun. Good luck to me!

The Mac

I bought a Mac-mini last Thursday. It has been sitting unconnected on my desk ever since.
This is the way I work. I do not like messing about with unfamiliar things, and I don't like messing about with hardware. If my PC taught me anything, is that new hardware causes pain. You insert a memory card, the screen stops working, the network card shuts down, and the entire computer laughs a hearty laugh.
Anyway, enough is enough, and today I braced for impact, connected my Mac-mini, and flipped the power switch on.
At first I was very upset. The thing wasn't working at all. The screen strangely displayed things, but no noise was emitted from the computer. I am used to the jet engine noise of my PC, which in writing translates to BROOOM BRM BRM BROOOOOOM CLICK CLICK CLICKEDLY CLACK. The Mac stood silently, mysteriously interacting with my screen and mouse. Well there is a simple explanation for this phenomena - the thing is obviously haunted.
So I started interacting with this eerie ghost, and the second terrifying thing occurred. it just worked.  No drivers needed, no 7 restarts, no spitting and hissing about unrecognized devices.
Quickly, I turned on my PC, which noisily started whirring, and together we stared at the spooky box on the table.
BRRRRM said my PC BRRM BRRRM CLICK CLICK.
Which, I think, was his way of saying that we should watch this thing, as it is likely to murder us in our sleep.