The Wheels Are Turning Once Again

I finally wrapped up the 'Map Project' (see previous blog) last night around midnight. It took me way longer than I thought it would take, seeing that I already had a 'draft' prototype, which I used to keep Alex busy on our X-mas trip to Shanghai last year. Instead of a few days it took me a few weeks, at which Simon & Sally were whittling sticks besides the road (so to speak). Even the 'final touches' took me hours instead of minutes. There's a lesson on life somewhere in there, but I can't put my finger on it. Maybe because my fingers are too eager to get back to writing.

So this morning I started fresh. I cleaned off my working space, moving design magazines, comic books, previous map models and prototypes, pencils, erasers, rulers and tape. I basically placed it onto the floor (as it usually ends up on). Then some heavy scrubbing of my desk, mouse and keyboard for that extra clean feeling (somewhere I heard those gather more bacteria than a toilet seat) and finally a laying out of plot source materials and random bits and pieces of notes and previous drafted documents that hold Simon's world together. On with The Tree of Life (now tentatively renamed: Lifebringer).

So where did I leave off? A month (or two? I can't remember) ago Simon had cast upon him a death sentence by the Fairy Tale Court in the Black Forest in Germany. That is, unless he can fulfill three quests in typical fairy tale tradition, but they range from slaying a dragon to defeating death. I've restructured some of the events that take place in this fairy tale domain on the printed plot document already, mainly because I'm aiming to cut back the number of words and non-related events. Still I have to spend time (and words) establishing a decent dialog between characters and filling out the 'In the Meantime...' chapters that will hopefully give the book that 'pageturning' quality.

Three relatively unrelated events including characters I will now be fusing together, making the next few chapters a little bit more connected (and flow easier) at which I also hope to cut out some of the 'filler'. The fun part is that I get to establish any kind of connection and background to existing fairy tale characters. At one point I'll have to look into possible copyright infringement and other such rights, but I think I'm safe. After all, there is a ton of material out there that reinvents fairy tales. Fables by Vertigo Comics, the Grimm Fairy Tails comic and the Sisters Grimm by Michael Buckley and more. For now I'm more interested in just telling a good story. The less than fun part is that I have to sift through hundreds of sentences to make sure I don't throw out essential story revelations or moments.

With that in mind I'm now less interested in maintaining a perfect balance of the monomyth and even consistently inserting extra chapters to keep the story perspective changing between characters. It has already taken me too long to plot, write and now redraft the book. If I can just concentrate on a smooth storytelling and decent realistic characters that grow then I'll rest in confidence that I took care of fleshing out the world's mythology and 'cool' aspects of the world in the first writing. After all: 1st draft = for me, rewrite = for other readers. Besides, Nancy and the publisher's editor will no doubt handle a well sharpened axe.

World Wide Ideas

I wrote a couple of entries ago about how I revived written material from an idea about Olympian gods and a young kid who discovers he's related to them. If this concept seems familiar, it's because it is: Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Yesterday walking through the Kinokuniya bookstore in Bangkok waiting for Despicable Me to start at the cinema so I could take Alex there I discovered something nifty. Now, mind you, this happens on a regular base, so it shouldn't be anything special, but it is. Browsing through the latest releases (and some obscure low-print ones) of young adult novels I found (yet another) book about fairy tales. It was called the Grimm Legacy. I read the back and found it to be a crossing between a modern tip-of-the-hat to the Grimm fairy tales and a young teen romance.

Now there seems to be nothing new under the sun. In fact there seems to be a veritable avalanche of Grimm Brothers fairy tale adaptations out there lately. It may have started with Shrek and Hoodwinked (or even the Princess Bride and Labyrinth before that) and crystallized into the written word with the Sisters Grimm, Vertigo's Fables and the excellent FableHaven. But as I found myself staring off into the distance still holding the Grimm Legacy I thought of the Stepsister Scheme that I have been reading lately and the copy of the graphic novel Grimm Fairy Tales by Ralph Tedesco lying on top of my nightstand. Does everyone have the same idea or is it that the Grimm Brothers' material is just too tempting (and obvious) to leave untouched? The same thing recently happened with a wave of Alice in Wonderland stories. A movie and TV-mini series, several written adaptations and tons of quotes in TV-shows and articles.


Is it just my inflated imagination or is the world not only connected through the Internet. but also starting to show signs of creative interconnectedness? It's almost like one idea is found in more place than one and is published in one form or another at almost the same time. Now this is all good news for me, because this concept ties into the actual storyline of Simon & Sally, so if I'm not the only one noticing this then this concept of a World Wide Web of Ideas and Inspiration might resonate with the readers. The idea that we as a human race are becoming more connected on some deeper level that transcends culture, nationality and mythology is interesting to explore. Luckily with all this exposure no one has yet published a novel series about the actual connections between fairy tales and other mythologies. Sure, magic and vampires have been done to death and there is a fair smattering of famous characters Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland. Even ancient pantheons have been explored. But to create a meta-mythology that spans all of these is my territory.


Ironically you will see by the time I get published even this idea might have two or three explorations on its resume. But that only feeds into the strength of the idea itself: that we live in a world of ideas, too large to belong to any one person, institution or region.