Comments on: Writing Excuses Episode 28: Writing for Webcomics with Phil and Kaja Foglio

By: A Thousand And One Parsecs » Making it up on the weekend

A Thousand And One Parsecs » Making it up on the weekend — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 06:12:11 +0000

[...] steampunk webcomic called Girl Genius. I heard about it when Brandon Sanderson and his buddies did a podcast with the creators of this comic, and got hooked on it shortly thereafter. It’s got a really [...]

By: Guerry

Guerry — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 02:19:09 +0000

@Topher: Don’t worry, I didn’t take offense. I appreciate the comments and advice! I vacillate between those that say there are no new ideas, and those that feel there are. I’d have to dig it out, but one of the grand masters said to avoid the old ideas unless you really had a different spin or know you will do it better. Of course, you would have to read a *lot* of SF to know what has / has not been done.

By: Topher

Topher — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 19:05:45 +0000

I would like to apologize Guerry, my last post really sounded like I was trashing your idea, which I was not trying to do. I support you in it, and we are all paying the million word price, I have paid part of mine on a story about a character that goes through a portal from our present world to a fiction world, as if that has’nt been done too many times. It was a tangent on the idea, not towards someones work. I would love to see someone really do something new with time travel, its just that, like superman and vampires, we all know the rules sorounding them, so it becomes just another story with original characters doing something not so original anymore. On the other side to this though, i would highly recommend using and overdone idea like time travel, corpsecicles, vampires ect. to not have to focus on the general outline as much since all the rules have been already written for you by other authors, and use it to focus on character and voice, dialogue and setting. I have written many stories where the plot was overdone many times but the fact that i didnt have to worldbuild at all, being i already had the rules, was able to write a great character, and was able to take that character and write them into something else more original. this has been my cure for writers block, maybe it will work for others as well, its my infinite writing prompt for myself, write a character doing something that has been done a thousand times, then once you have an interesting character, take that character and write him into something original.

By: Guerry

Guerry — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 02:16:08 +0000

Oh, hope springs eternal. I’ve got a different spin on it that’s character driven and not paradox driven. It also depends on the fact that you can’t change anything. Either way, I’m still paying my 1 million word price, so if it sales, fine. If not, then I’m still learning alot about POV, etc.

Thanks all!

Guerry

By: Ben

Ben — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 01:03:46 +0000

Something that most people forget is that if you’re going to have a time machine, you can only go back to when it was originally built.

If you build it in 1995 then in 3016, the limit backwards is 1995.

However, Topher has a good point; it has been done to death. If you want to write for practice, it’s probably great, as it is interesting. Nevertheless, to sell would take a level of writing that I personally do not have. Though I probably won’t sell anything, I am enthusiastic.

So who knows, do what you love, and hope for the best.

By: Topher

Topher — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:11:40 +0000

time travel really is exreamly over done though. there have been so many stories on it, which some are interesting, many just repeat themselves in one way or another. either in a machine, harry potters time turner and like devices, even corpsecicles are essentialy time travel. i read sci-fi and fantasy to be taken to the future or a more interesting past. i say let the books themselves be the time travel device, because i dont think i can really take another story about bouncing around in time through some device, but thats just my opinion.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:47:17 +0000

Hi,

Its very rare to find a novel or movie that actually clears up every single time paradox. I’ve generally stayed away from time travel, because its so easy to lose yourself and forget what joe soap did when he went back in time the second time, and what effect this would have on his 4th visit, which would thus effect the present. etc. (I love writing sci-fi).
Do I have to study einsteins law of relativity??

How important is it to tell the reader these laws.

I’d love a podcast on time travel.

By: Topher

Topher — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 06:45:12 +0000

guerry, you bring up an interesting topic on which I have tried to write stories around a few times, but always ended up discarding them. this would be paralel universes and timelines. I have always ended up discarding them, because I felt as if I was going down the same road as Philip pullman in His Dark Materials. I hope that you have better luck with it than I, sadly I gave up that road to try something else. Which of course was a time machine, and having heard your experience with the machine, I can also testify that it did not work out the way I planned. No matter what I tried, I keep failing to win the heart of Catherine The Great. I am currently working on a mind control device, so when I get positive results I shall post the blueprints online. Then I shall bring Catherine to present day, and she can do a podcast on leadership and politics. Wish me luck, she’s Fiesty!

By: Guerry

Guerry — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 20:40:19 +0000

I’m with you Dan. My current story is playing with parallel universes and parallel timelines where both aspects are different across parallels but still recognizable, hence my babbling.

I love SF.

I agree on a time travel podcast. Can of worms!

By: Dan Wells

Dan Wells — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 19:11:12 +0000

Alas, Guerry, I subscribe to the “12 Monkeys” style of paradox resolution, in which the past is unchangeable regardless of time travel. So you’re stuck in midlist romance, and I’m afraid there’s nothing that can be done.

Man, we totally need to do a podcast on time travel.