Twitter meme… who would have thought…

I know, I know.. a meme for twitter? What, are you mad Yana? No, I’m a sucker for memes, and if you knew me on dA you’d totally already know this! Lol!

So… my first twitter meme.. and first meme on this writing blog.  So, some questions about me…

If you could go back in time and relive one moment, what would it be?

That day I finished Time Speaker that first time.  I’ve never felt that wonderful before and that powerful within myself – I did something people said was impossible for me to do.  Best. Feeling. Ever.  And decided me on my career of sci fi writer, and the goal of living off my writing.

If you could go back in time and change one thing, what would it be?

I would go back in time to the worst time in my life, and I would hug myself and tell her that she could do it and to not give up hope.  But I wouldn’t change any more about my past because it defines who I am now.

What movie/TV character do you most resemble in personality?

*Blushes* Probably Kaylee from Firefly/Serenity.  I do tend to be a bit of a polly-anna…

If you could push one person off a cliff and get away with it, who would it be?

I wouldn’t.  It’s not my purpose to judge and kill others, regardless of what evil they may or may not do in their life.

Name one habit you want to change in yourself.

Not a habit, more of a disability: my social anxiety disorder.  I’m sick of being underestimated by offline folks because I’m unable to speak my mind through the anxiety.

Describe yourself in one word.

Detirmined… perhaps Obstinate is a better word… don’t tell me what I can’t do because I’ll probably do it just to spite you. XD

Describe the person who named you in this meme in one word.

One word?  Impossible!  I haven’t known Tracy particularly long but she seems like a fun, interesting and intelligent person who I’d love to get to know further. :3

Why do you blog? Answer in one sentence.

Um.  Well, this blog is purely for me to blather on about my writing universe, writing process and the process of creating the massive website I’m doing with little to no resources and expertise.  And eventually, when I’m famous I’d like to have a place where folks can read about what I’m doing and what’s new in the Time Speaker universe.

As part of this meme roaming the blogosphere I must Name at least 3 people to send this meme to, and then inform them.

Sorry, but I don’t tag people.  I’ll post a linkie to this on twitter and if anyone wants to do it they’re welcome.

Another, so soon?

So my brain has been a hot plate of creativity and ideas lately.  It’s amazing what just relaxing and not freaking out about what hasn’t been done yet can do for creative juices.

I want this website of mine to be awesome.

I know that sounds a bit conceited but I want folks to come and visit for fun, for interest, for something that’ll entertain and keep people interested.  So I’m always figuring out to make it better.  I want to up the anti as they say here in NZ.

I had this idea.  Well, actually, I re-remembered the original idea.  I’ve always wanted to create an online presence that is kind of like stepping directly into the universe of the books.  Long term plans are to create a game kind of like world of warcraft – 3D and addictive – but in the Time Speaker Universe.

Now, I was thinking yesterday how I can turn what I have of the website into literally stepping into the universe like that original dream.  And I got an idea.  What if I make Rahan Aria (a blip character) into a bigger character, but bigger outside of the story.  He’s a Computer Talent, he’s a gloriously geeky personality and playful… what if Raha made a website for Hawk?  What would he need to put up?  What would it look like?  How could I realistically make it with little-to-no resources so that it’s like you’ve stumbled upon an illegal website of the Rebels?

Now, some of my ideas I can’t do.. I don’t have the money or know-how to do a guerrilla campaign online like they sort of did for Lost, but I can do some of these ideas.  The image is that Raha will make a hub area online.  Untraceable, that’ll piggy-back other major sites, that’ll give information to the Reader about the universe, while also making a game of things.  Make riddles etc. to link to secret pages with extra information for the Universe, make Raha’s hub page like a “glossary” that’ll link to the pages with the relevant information on “other websites”… like… stuff about the definition etc. of Psi and Talent will link to an area that looks like the Agency site, stuff about the Church of the Founder will look like their website.. and so on… and I’ll pepper the pages with codes and ciphers and fun twirly bits for people to work out so they can find the hidden “Rebel” pages.

This sounds like a lot of work.. I totally know… but it’ll be fun too.  So I’m going to start off with just setting up the “other website” pages and the main hub.  Once I have much of the Glossary data up and working and indexed with the scenes in Rise of Hawk, I’ll then work on the ciphers and secret pages.

Perhaps I can put myself up on the site as a fellow Rebel, telling the stories.  Like.. I’m actually in the Rebels and writing these stories to raise funds for the Rebels.  So buy a book support the cause!

XD

This is going to be fun, I think. :3

Mythology and reality

I just finished watching all of Babylon 5.  Five seasons over five weeks.  And, while I was blubbering over the very last episode I realised something.  Of all the sci fi stuff I’ve been watching lately, B5 is the closest to what I want for the Time Speaker universe.  Not necessarily in measurable or directly comparable things, but in the effect it has on people.

The intention isn’t just fame and a fun universe within which I can prance around and have a play (though, those are definitely part of my intentions.  I want to make something that encourages people to care about something other than themselves.  I want people to ball their eyes out when certain characters die, when certain characters go through a painful transformation.  I want to make something that brings out deep emotion in others.  Like a myth.  I want the Time Speaker universe to join in on the modern myths.  The stories that matter to people, the stories that bring in new ideas and new ways of thinking and comparing in the world.  I want it to be used to launch new growth, other people’s careers, new ways of being and thinking.  If I can I want to help people in real ways, whether indirectly through people participating in the universe and making money, or directly with all my projects I’m going to initiate once the money starts rolling in.

I know the odds against me a high, but the thing people who say that I don’t have chance don’t know, is that I will not give up.  And because I will not give up I will keep going.  Even if all that I’ve done does nothing until I’m dead, those are my goals.  And the secret is I’ve seen the future in my dreams, I’ve seen it for over fifteen years.  I’m not claiming to know everything or even anything of importance in the world, but the vision of this project is so clear and so strong inside me that I think I’m one of those self-fulling prophecies – it will happen because I’ll make it happen because the vision is so strong I can do nothing else but push out towards making it real.

As the last quote in the first page of the books says, neither the vision nor the event causes the event or the vision, because the two are not separate, they are part of the same event.

I’m really scared.  I’m scared I’ll fail and my life will be over.  But I’m also scared that I’ll succeed.  My vision is so clear and it’s huge.  It’s massive.  If it comes to pass.  If make it happen out of shear will, am I a good enough person to keep it from going to my head?  Is my inner voice loud and clear enough to remain myself and to handle the “fame” that could be coming?  Or.  Or am I subconsciously an ego maniac to think such wonders could happen in my life?  Is it bad that a loud voice inside me says clearly and loudly that it is not self delusion, that I can do this and that I WILL do this.

I want to leave this world a better place.  I want to leave my mark.  I want to show people that no matter what it is that keeps a person trapped in their life, that they have the ability and the resources to get out of that trap.  I want to reach out and free people of the traps and desolation they find themselves in, but I don’t want to do it for them, I want to give them the opportunity… kind of supply the ladder down the hole that they themselves have to climb up.  I want to give people that no one else things has a hope in hell, a hope and the truth that they can get out of their situation.  I want to facilitate other people going for their dreams.

I know it all sounds a bit big and airy fairy.. I mean, it’s just a fictional universe.  But… you know it’s more than that for me.  I wouldn’t be here without this writing.  I have no doubt that I would be dead with out the hope that this universe gave me in creating it.  And I think with the money and “power” I can get access through with the extensions of this universe, I can do so much good… as well as hopefully tell a damn good story.

But right now at this moment I am desperately lonely.

My best friend is so far away from me.  The one person in this world who truly understands me is out of contact – now I wouldn’t change that for the world, she’s doing what she loves and striving towards her goals and every day I’m proud of her for having the courage to go for her dreams.  But I do often feel alone and I do miss having someone around who totally gets what I’m trying to do.

I need a partner in crime… well, a second partner in crime… no one could ever replace Wraithy.  She’s my soul sister.  But I could use someone who loves this story as much as she and I do, someone I can bounce ideas off of, and someone who can really help me with the stuff I find difficult or impossible to do on my own.  Spidey has Jesu.  Even Heather has her fellow dark jedi friend.  Not that many people I know right now could handle who I am behind the masks, apparently I’m scary.  I frighten myself sometimes, with my passion, with my drive, with my inability to give up on this dream.. it’s terrifying.  Terrifying simply because by all accounts if you never give up on something and you keep working towards it you will get there eventually.

How do I stop being phobic of my own potential success?  How do I learn to open up enough to have another partner in crime so that for once I don’t feel so gods damned alone?

I know I’m not alone.  I can feel Wraithy, she’s just at my fingertips, always there in the back of my heart and mind.  I can feel Spirit and all the ancestor voices.  I can feel the real life equivalent of the To’asha song and light in the centre of my soul.  I can feel my mum and my brother connected to my heart, and Errol, my oldest friend.. and his damn chickens.. lol.  I can feel all those I’ve connected to through the internet and all those I will connect to in the future.  I’m not alone, not really.  But, even knowing and sensing these things, I still feel very much alone right now and I’m not sure how to remedy it.

I don’t think it’s remotely fair to enter into a romantic relationship right now – it wouldn’t be fair, they would come third or fourth in my priorities.. How do you tell a prospective mate “I’m sorry, not only are you second to my family and my personal well-being, but also my writing”?  How is it fair to tell someone that no matter how much I love them, David’s story comes first.  I’ve tried in the past to put that out in the open and it was still one of the contributing factors to the dissolution of at least one of my past relationships.

I need to stop now or I’ll go all emo and start whining more… and here I hear Tom Cruise as Lestat: “Luey luey, still whining I see..”  Gods I love that line.  Well, if anyone’s out there to read, I’m signing off.

And to all those who may read back on this post: <3 Much love and fluffy ducks.. as they say.

Night universe.  May my loneliness be eased sometime soon and my dreams begun to realise themselves in financially advantageous ways.

<3

Planning brainwave, re: Psi Rebel Dynasties

Psi Rebel Dynasties was a story/novel/series I wrote for some of 2009 and most of 2010.  The intention was to tell the story of Jerna Ree’s journey on creating the Psi Rebels, and then the following generations up to 19 Aracan 3000 when Hawk came into the picture.

But, it was kind of a failure.  I mean, that said, I have some of my very favourite scenes in Rise of Hawk and it did to some degree show the sequences and events in three generations of Psi Rebels, but the story was patchy with large sections of time between events and it didn’t match the format that is most compatible with a traditional novel.  I pretty much finished first gen and second gen, and half did third and fourth gen, and put it aside because I wanted to start on my precious Hawk generation story (Rise of Hawk).

While I was writing Psi Rebel Dynasty I collected a bunch of data on the Rebels pertaining to all of the Rebels pre-Hawk, their births, deaths, what happened to them etc.  Then I collated the information and created “Jerna’s Notebook”, at first digitally and then eventually I got enough book binding skills to create a hard copy.  I found it again today in one of my Universe archive boxes.  As I read through it, and partially re-lived their stories through Jerna’s “notes”, then Ain,  Jean, Krena and finally Hilla, an idea developed in my head.

What if I keep the Psi Rebel Dynasty story pretty much as it is, in little pockets of stories, and use a digital version of Jerna’s Notebook as the index for these stories.  People can read each story separately.  I mean, most of the stories build upon the previous stories, but are also just fine as their own story.

I’d have to go back and re-write second gen, and figure out what I want to do with the Kaan story (re-write, finish or cut out the middle sections of the story) and the escapes between the loss of the Kaans and the Rise of Hawk.

Make the Dynasties section deliberately cut up into smaller stories.  And then add to them with Post-Hawk escape stories and side stories and stuff.

Jerna’s stories are pretty much all ready to go up and be posted.  I’d just need to figure out where I want to put Jerna’s Notebook in the website, and figure out a different book-type background to serve as the background of the pages.  Maybe make the index page the contents at the beginning of the Notebook.

Problem being that it might be difficult to do for the post-Hawk stuff because by 3004 there are over 2,000 Rebels, and almost all escapees from the Agency.  I’m not keen on writing all of the escapes, just those mentioned in Rise of Hawk, and perhaps… maybe… some of Jaola’s adventures from 3007-3010.

I’ll have to figure out the structure so that it can be expanded and contracted depending on the stories I want to put up or have time to write.

I probably won’t start this idea in earnest until I’ve finished a full draft of Rise of Hawk so I know what will be involved.  And of course I’ll need to do that very final edit check of Time Speaker and make it available to buy on lulu etc. before I can really start in earnest on this.  But, it might be another way of getting all these fucking stories out of my head and bring in a little more cash.

We’ll see.  I’m not sure Novellas would sell would they?

Well…

… at about 8am this morning keyanadrake.com went live.  It took me about four or five hours to configure, finish and upload all the site I have on my hardrive.  It’s still not done, but I’m really happy with it.

It has crossed my mind today that all this work may turn out nothing much because I still don’t know exactly how I’m going to get people to the site to read the first three sections of Rise of Hawk.  But, I didn’t know how I was going to get the website up in the first place and it happened, so I’m going to have faith that what I do not know will simply come to me or the paths I need to go down to learn  will come to me.

I still can’t believe I can code basic html.  Me… the mild technophobe.  Well.. not exactly technophobe, but I do tend to get mighty uncomfortable with stuff I don’t already know how to do.  But it was worth it and I’ve found that I enjoy htmling… well… I enjoy the finished product.

I’m going to finish the parts of the site I have plans for and can do myself.  Then I’m going to back to W3schools and continue learning.  If I have the patience to learn html mostly on my own, perhaps I can learn the “harder” stuff, and then, maybe then, with a little animated gif program and maybe a copy of dreamweaver, maybe *I’m* the one who can eventually make that awesome 3D scrolling map I’ve seen in my minds eye.  But.. the star map is a while away.  I’ll keep at it on my computer, but I don’t need to post it up until I’ve finished and lulu published Time Speaker and Rise of Hawk… and there’s a crap load to do before they’re done.

To do list:
* Get a twitter account
* Get better accustomed to using facebook
* Get a lulu account
* Look at the prices and profit of other digital and hard copy suppliers/sellers
* Research amazon’s selling legalities
* Get an adware account with google
* Finish keyanadrake.com to at least the points I know I can
* Install some kind of shop on the website
* Commission artists to do the covers of Rise of Hawk and Time Speaker
* Design and code the Kitchen Witch website
* When Kitchen Witch is away humming, go onto the weight loss one and so on.

**Get free of this governmental allowance**

No.. I don’t want the world!  Just most of it

<3

Hello new blog…

So, this shall be my new blog, my blog of awesome.  Lol.  Well, perhaps not awesome, but about writing and my universe, getting published… living the dream… all that guff.

I will endeavour to minimise whining, bitching, moaning and generally acting like a douche bag when I have bad days, and I will try very hard not to give any massive spoilers for writing to come.  Anything else…  is up for negotiation and the sometimes fickle decisions of an author.

<3

Today (well, the beginning of this year), is the beginning of my new leaf on life.  I want to be published, I want to write for a living and I want others to love my work.  Now I can’t do too much about that last one, but with a little faith and belief in myself and a lot of one of my greatest strengths (persistence) I am teaching myself html and I am about to start my massive website that I’ve planned and dreamed of for nearly ten years in earnest.  This blog will form a part of the website.

The plan is to create a site where I can post up scenes from Rise of Hawk and perhaps later books for people to read.  I also want the website to be a place where people can immerse themselves in the universe, and find extras and Easter eggs to the story they already love.  In addiction to that, I’d like a shop for selling art and maps and all that.  I also want to collate the posted stories as books and sell them as a digital book as well as hard copy books through sites like lulu.com and my website shop.  The hope is that I can generate enough of a fan base or perhaps get the attentions of the right people to get the rest of my series published in the conventional sense.  My focus is equal parts “fame” and “money”.  My priority is getting out there and having readers who love the universe.  I want the “fame” part so I can get “immortality” as one of the “great sci fi” writers of my time, I want to become a part of the genre.  The “money” part is partially, of course about my wish to not be poor any more, but partially also because I have a number of ideas about how to use money to genuinely and effectively help people gain freedom in their lives, and those ideas/programs require a lot of funds.

I want to be free, I want to free others and I want to be immortal.

Another part of the plan is to facilitate other writers and artists, at first through publishing fan fiction and using art of scenes/aspects of the writing universe to advertise myself and the artist, and then later through the founding of organisations and programs that will support writers and artists bring their dreams to reality.  I want to enrich my life, and then spread that enrichment as far as I can and help others out of the mud.

Ultimately, in my biggest wildest dreams, I want a TV series and movies in my universe.  I want to see my characters on the screen and permeate our modern culture in a similar scale as Star Wars and Star Trek and Stargate, and all the known sci fi universes.  Maybe have computer games as well

I know this dream sounds huge, it sounds like I’m a power hungry maniac.  But I want to be a force for good in the world, I want to have lived and be remembered.  And I want to do something I love for a living.  I want my career and my impact on the world to be something that I am passionate about and something that I love.  This writing universe and all the hundreds of characters and stories within it is something I love and something I’m passionate about, I breathe it now.  And, the truth is I don’t want to do anything else.  I mean, I can do something else if I have to, but this is what I want to do, this is a part of my identity and I refuse to let go of it and I refuse to allow the cynicism of others crush my hopes and dreams.

So what if it’s improbable!  I don’t care, I’m doing it.  If all those people in our history who did amazing things listened to the nay-sayers we wouldn’t have those events.  Sir Peter Blake.  Sir Edmund Hillary.  The great pioneering figures of science, politics, medicine, physics, science fiction… they all, when faced with people who told them it was impossible simply turned away and did it anyway.  That’s what I’m doing.  I have to believe it’s going to happen because there’s no other option.

This is my religion.  I have absolute faith that it’s going to happen if I just keep chugging along.  And that’s what I’m doing.

So… ON TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD!