#serialized fiction

[howtofightwrite]

this scenario happened on Twenty-Four and they didnt really account for the long term damage -evelynmlewis

"No long term consequences" could have been the tagline for 24. I mean, we are talking about the show where terrorists detonated a nuclear weapon in Los Angeles, and a few hours later people were going about their daily lives like nothing had happened. But, I think I remember what you're talking about, and it was a small symptom of a much larger problem.

Two important caveats: I haven't watched season 3 in roughly 20 years, so I might be slightly misremembering when things happen. Second, IMDB's trivia page doesn't have any mentions of what I'm about to say, so it's entirely possible this was a fiction cooked up by someone on TV Tropes.

The short version was that Chase (James Badge Dale) was captured and was being tortured by a Mexican cartel. (Because no synopsis of 24 is complete without gratuitous torture sequences.) And, at one point, one of the cartel members shoots him through the hand. The problem is that Chase was originally planned to be killed off right at the beginning of the next episode.

However, going into season 3, the show runners had, supposedly, gotten into a bad habit of watching fansites, and started tweaking things on the fly, when fans accurately predicted the outcomes of upcoming plot twists. This included keeping Chase alive, when the original plan was to kill him off, and also killing off Chappelle (Paul Schulze), later in the season.

So, I mentioned that the plans for Chase's execution being changed are a bit dubious, that's not true with Chappelle, and there's a couple major things to pick up on here. First is that we have confirmation from Paul Schulze that the original plan was to fake his character's death. (This came out of an interview Schulze did, though I'm not sure with whom.) The second is a production cue from the way the show was produced. By season 3, the show was being shot in two episode blocks, (so, for example, Day 3: 1:00 p.m. – Day 3: 2:00 p.m., and Day 3: 2:00 p.m. – Day 3: 3:00 p.m. were shot at the same time. Also, yeah, the official episode titles are a bit unwieldy.) In the case of Chappelle's death, it came at right before 7am (which would have been part of the shooting block for 5am to 7am.) However, Chase's death would have been right after 9pm. (Which would have been part of the 9pm to 11pm block.) This would mean that the production would have needed to bring James Badge Dale back in for what would have amounted to a glorified cameo, if they were originally planning to kill off his character. Once you're aware of the way that episodes were shot, the pacing of the series gets a lot more predictable. Significant characters (even short term ones) tend to get introduced in the front half of a block, and killed off in the back half. Not necessarily the same block, but the structure tends to hold up. Especially when the show plays with the idea of someone dying during the episode cliffhanger.)

So, where am I going with this? Don't mess with your story to keep your audience off-balance. Your first concern is keeping your story coherent, if members of your audience manage to accurately predict what you're doing, good. They're invested enough in the story that you're telling to care about what you're going to do next. These are the last people you want to mess with. And if their prediction is correct, when it does play out, that's a reward for them.

Don't follow the example of 24(especially in season 3), where the overarching plot degenerates into an incoherent mess, because it keeps getting revised, on the fly, to keep things surprising. A well written thriller shouldn't be predictable, but it should have internal consistency so when the unexpected happens, it makes sense. A second viewing (or reading) of a thriller, should provide more satisfaction, as you can now see all the pieces getting dropped into place, long before they pay off. But, again, when you're writing in a serial format, if you start flipping things around to keep ahead of what your audience is predicting, that will ruin the cohesion of your story. (And, it's why I haven't watched Season 3 since shortly after it released on DVD. When I did go back and rewatch the first two years of the show.) While it's a bit uneven, it is something the first season of 24handled remarkably well, especially in comparison to what came later.

There's a couple advantages to writing in a serialized format. If you're unfamiliar with the term, serialized fiction refers when a piece of fiction is released in multiple parts over time. This is somewhat distinct from episodic series and metaplots. Episodic series tell multiple self contained stories, while metaplots refer to an overarching storyline that hooks into episodic stories granting them a larger context. Serials are smaller parts of a larger whole. The individual pieces (or, in the case of television, the episodes) are segmented portions of a larger story. Now, I said there are advantages to serialized writing, but almost all of those come with some significant perils, that if you're wanting to

The first advantage is you don't have to have the work completed before you start putting it out there. If you have a completed chapter, you can simply post it out there for the world to see. The peril is that you can't (really) go back and change it. You're committed to the previously released material. Even if you go back and revise the earlier work, you'll have a significant portion of your audience who don't want to go back and reread chapter 3, because you cleaned up the dialog, and also closed a plot hole that would emerge years later.

The second advantage is that serials can easily deliver much larger stories than you could offer in another format. For example, each season of 24 tells a single twenty-four hour story (actually, about 18 hours, once you account for commercial breaks.) Just putting that scope in front of someone is kind of wild. The peril is that serialized stories can easily spiral out of control. For example, nearly every webcomic ever, with an ongoing plot. This can result in some insane bloat. So you can either accept the content in medias res, or you can be looking at an unpleasant amount of homework. Whatever praise 24 deserves, the show asks you for an entire day of your life to watch a single story. When put in those terms, frankly, it's not that good.

The third advantage is that you can adjust your later work to better fit what your audience responds well to. If your fans like something you're doing, you can expand that part of your story. This time, there's multiple perils. First, you can easily lose track of how your original plan fit together. This is less of an issue if you're running with a fairly loose outline, but the better scripted your original plan, the more this can inadvertently screw you over. And, as I mentioned above, with the first peril, you can easily trap yourself. For an example I'm not completely conversant in, this might be what's delayed the final Game of Thrones book, as Martin may have accidentally killed off a character he needed, and now he's spent years working out a Plan B. The second peril is a little simpler, sometimes fans are reacting to what you didn't say, rather than what you did. Peripheral characters or concepts can prove to be fan favorites because the hints you provided along the way were more enticing than the full background you had in mind. This is a very subjective risk, because ultimately, it is more about accurately gauging what your audience reacted to rather than what they said they reacted to. That's a tricky one to split.

The fourth advantage to serialized writing is, almost, more a peril disguised as an advantage: You don't have to know how this will end, when you start. You can go on the same journey as your reader. The real advantage is that it can make the story more approachable. If you look at the idea of writing an entire novel, and the scope of that scares you, then smaller serialized novellas are a lot less threatening. However, this also means you don't have a plan to finish this. Much your characters, you're going to need to figure it out on your feet. If that sounds like a fun challenge, then that's absolutely something to drop into the “Pros” column. The downside is, I've seen professionals screw this up, and worse, get it past their editor. (In this case, I'm thinking specifically of Transmetropolitan. If you know, you know; if you don't, it's a massive spoiler for the end of the series.)

I will say, on this last peril, having good documentation, and a good project bible can save your ass. Don't trust your memory to keep all the (figurative) plates spinning. Take notes on what you're doing in another document, so that in the future you'll have easy reference to try to avoid accidentally creating temporal paradoxes as you try to sketch out your conclusion.

Also, yeah, if you're going to shoot someone in the hand, even if it's with a .22, don't change your mind about killing them 20 minutes later. James Badge Dale was cool, but, dude had nothing to do but chew scenery for fifteen hours.

-Starke

This blog is supported through Patreon. Patrons get access to new posts three days early, and direct access to us through Discord. If you’re already a Patron, thank you. If you’d like to support us, please consider becoming a Patron.

[tunnelduck]

HEY, if there’s anyone that thoroughly enjoyed Dracula Daily or are yearning for more serialized classic lit, next year they’re beginning The Big Read where everyone subscribed reads 5 classic novels over the course of a year by getting regular emails w pages from them (just like Dracula Daily).

The reading list this year is:

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurty (January-March)

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith (April-May)

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (June-September)

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (October)

East of Eden by John Steinbeck (November-December)

Have fun!

[newwinslowma]

The moment of stomach dropping TERROR I had this week listening to @worldgonewrongpod in my car as it began to rain...

I have so many thoughts on this show that I badly need to untangle and share

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Serializing the opening of “The Lost Cause”

On October 7–8, I'm in Milan to keynote Wired Nextfest.

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful tale of the climate emergency, which comes out on November 14. Kim Stanley Robinson called it "an unforgettable vision of what could be":

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865939/the-lost-cause

I'm currently running a Kickstarter campaign to pre-sell the audiobook, which I produced and narrated myself (for complex and awful reasons, Amazon won't carry my audiobooks, see the Kickstarter campaign page for details). You can also pre-order the ebook and hardcovers, including signed and personalized copies:

http://lost-cause.org

For the next week or so, I'm going to be serializing the prologue of the book, which gets it off to quite a spicy start. Here's part one!

I thought that I was being so smart I signed up for the over nightwhen pager duty for the solar array at Burroughs High. Solar arrays don’t do anything at night. Because it’s dark. They’re not lunar arrays.

Turns out I outsmarted myself.

My pager app went off at 1:58 a.m., making a sound that I hadn’t heard since the training session, GNAAP GNAAP GNAAP, with those low notes that loosened your bowels offset by high notes that tightened your sphincter. I slapped around my bed for my screen and found the lights and found my underwear and a tee and then the cargo pants I wore on work duty and blinked hard and rubbed my eyes until I could think clearly enough to confirm that I was dressed, had everything that I needed, and then double-­checked the pager app to make sure that I really, actually needed to go do something about the school’s solar array at, I checked, 2:07 a.m.

2:07 a.m.! Brooks, you really outsmarted yourself.

Gramps’s house had started out as a two bed/one bath, like most of the houses in Burbank, but it had been expanded with a weird addition at the back—­again, like most of the houses in Burbank—­giving it a third bedroom and a second bath. That was my room, and it had its own sliding door to the backyard, so I let myself out without waking Gramps.

It was warm enough that I didn’t need a jacket, which was good because I’d forgotten to put one on. Still, there was just enough of a nip in the air that I jogged a little to get my blood going. Burbank was quiet, just the sound of the wind in the big, mature trees that lined Fairview Street, a distant freight train whistle, a car zooming down Verdugo. My breath was louder than any of them. A dog barked at me and startled me as I turned onto Verdugo, streetlit and wide and empty, too.

Two minutes later, I was at Burroughs, using my student app to buzz myself into the school’s gate, then the side entrance, then the utility stairs, and then I jogged up the stairs. I was only supposed to get paged if the solar array had an error it couldn’t diagnose for itself, and that the manufacturer’s techs couldn’t diagnose from its camera feeds and other telemetry. Basically, never. Not at 2:00 a.m. 2:17 a.m. now. I wondered what the hell it could be. I opened the roof access door just in time to hear a glassy crashing sound, like a window breaking, and I froze.

Someone was on the roof with me. A person, glimpsed in the corner of my eye and then lost in the darkness. Too big to be a raccoon. A person. On the roof.

“Hello?” Gramps’s friends sometimes made fun of my voice. I’d hated how high-­pitched it was when I was a freshman and had dreamed of it getting deeper someday, but now I was a senior, weeks away from graduation, and I still got mistaken for a girl on gamer voice-­chats. I’d made my peace with it, except that I hadn’t entirely because I was not happy at all with how it squeaked out over that roof. “Hello?” I tried for deeper. “Someone there?” No one answered, so I took a step out onto the roof. Glass crunched under my feet. It was dark and it stayed dark when I slapped at the work-­lights switch next to the door—­they should have been tripped by the motion anyway. I found my flashlight and twisted it to wide beam and checked my feet. Smashed glass, all right, and when I swung the light around to the nearest solar bank, I saw that each panel had been methodically shattered. I took a step back toward the door, and the light beam swung up and caught the man.

He was wearing a head-­to-­toe suit—­a ghillie suit, Gramps’s friends called them—­and holding a short four-­pound sledgehammer with a handle and head painted in nonreflective black that swallowed my light beam. He was coming toward me. I reflexively hit the bodycam 911 emergency switch on my screen and it sounded its “Warning, bodycam recording” alert in a warm woman’s voice that I’d chosen for its nonthreatening tone. Mostly I bodycammed when I was having an argument with someone and the calm voice was a good balance between cooling things out and satisfying California’s two-­party consent rules for recording.

As he raised the hammer, I wished that I’d chosen the cop voice instead.

“Wait,” I said, taking a step back. The roof access door had closed behind me. “Please.”

“Shit,” the man said. He was using a voice-­shifter, either a separate unit or part of the ghillie suit. His voice was deep as a diesel engine. “Dammit, you’re just a kid.” He used the hand that wasn’t holding the hammer to flip up his nightscope goggles and peer at me. His eyes, visible in the ghillie suit’s slit, were bloodshot and wrinkled and blue. He squinted at my light and brandished the hammer. “Shit,” he said again. “Get that out of my eyes, dammit.”

“Sorry,” I squeaked, and lowered the beam, casting it around.

It seemed like 80 percent of the panels were ruined. Why had I said sorry? Force of habit. “Shit.” If he could say it, I could too.

“Shit. What the hell are you doing, man?”

“You’re recording this, kid?”

“Yes. Livestreaming.”

“Good, then I’ll explain. You just stay there and we won’t have a problem. I was gonna have to make a video when this was done, you’re just saving me the trouble.” He lowered the hammer and let it dangle. I thought about rushing him, but I’m not a fighter, and he was still holding the hammer. Same for turning and trying to get out the door before he could catch up with me.

“Kay, listen up. This world we’re in, it’s debased. America’s been rotted from the inside. First it was immigrants. You might think I’m a racist, but I’m not. It’s not immigrants I object to. It’s illegals. You want to come to America, you come in the front door, on the terms your gracious hosts here are offering. You don’t skip the line or break in through the window. That’s what a criminal does. You let in a criminal, let ’em become citizens, soon enough they’re voting for other criminals.

“You know just what I’m talking about, don’t kid yourself. The money we’re spending now? This Green New Deal? This Jobs Guarantee? These fuckin’ solar panels? Bill’s gonna come due on this. There’s no such thing as a free lunch. Chinese hoaxed us into believing in this climate garbage, then they got us to go into hock to them up to our eyeballs to buy their shiny crap, and then they’re gonna charge us interest, and our kids, and their kids, and their kids. Mortgaging their future? Shit, what future? They’re headed for debt bondage for eternity. Biblical. It’s Biblical.

“All this mumbo jumbo about ‘money users’ and ‘money creators’—­it’s just word games. There’s two kinds of people in this world, and it’s not ‘money users’ and ‘money creators’—­it’s ‘makers’ and ‘takers.’ The makers create all the wealth, the takers elect politicians who confiscate it and redistribute it.” “Redistribute” came out like another f-­bomb.

This was crazy, but it wasn’t unfamiliar. I’d heard versions of this conversation around Gramps’s place ever since I came to live with him, back when I was eight. More, I’d heard these specific words before. I pressed my recollections, tried to put a face to the words. All the faces in Gramps’s living room had a sameness, a whiteness, matching haircuts and the same Maga hats, faded and frayed. Who had said those words? I could bring the face to mind now, the rest of the face that went with those blue watery eyes peering out of the ghillie suit.

Now, the name. Mark. Not Mark. Mike. Mike! Mike, uh.

“Mike Kennedy?”

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/06/green-new-deal-fic/#the-first-generation-in-a-century-not-to-fear-the-future

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!

[interpersonalchemistry]

“Shouldn’t you be out there selling merch?” asked Mitch, half joking while Avi continued to look over his wounds and clean him up. It was just the two of them in a quiet corner of the locker room, finally alone after Louis dragged Sandy away and Jodie had come around to check up on him, her concern palpable until Avi assured her that he had it under control. 

“Nah,” Avi lied; Mitch could tell, but he put up no argument. Everything was excruciating, and he wanted Avi there for some kind of support while the brain fuzz continued to amplify. He scratched at his neck then stared down at the dried blood under his fingernails, and thought about Nate doing the same elsewhere in the building. The mental image quickly dissipated when Avi’s thumb pad grazed a few tender spots. Despite Avi’s gentle touches, Mitch was too sore for this.

-

Interpersonal Chemistry is a story about misfit indie wrestlers that takes place in the fictional city of Monument, Massachusetts. It’s rated M, intended for mature audiences only due to sensitive subject matters such as: mental illness, addiction, trauma, violence (typical of the setting), and vulgar language. New to Interpersonal Chemistry? Start here! 

[through-your-eye]

LOG 17 - NIGHT

> Query. Location.

[Hm?]

[Oh. I'm not sure.]

[Just.]

[On the side of the road.]

[I guess.]

> Query. Why?

[I'm tired.]

[I'm.]

[Yeah.]

[It's night out.]

[I need some rest.]

> Query. Night?

[Oh. Right.]

[It's uh.]

[It's when the sun goes down.]

[The sun is the big ball of uh. Of light.]

[In the sky.]

[Night time is when the sun goes down, and it can't be seen.]

[So everything gets dark.]

[Means I can't see, like you.]

[Well, I mean, I can.]

[The moon is up.]

[Big rock in the sky.]

[Like the sun, but for the night.]

[And there's stars in the sky.]

[But it's still harder to see.]

> Description catalogued.

> Query. Stars?

[I uh.]

[Don't know what they are.]

[There used to be more of them, I think.]

[They're just there.]

> Query. Number of Stars?

[Uh, I think there was.]

[I'll check.]

[Dut, dut, dut, dut, dut, duh.]

[Six.]

[I think a few more have gone out.]

[Wonder what it'll look like when they're all gone.]

> System Command. Let there be light.

System Notice. Radiance engaged.

[what the fuck]

[ml-nolan]

You know how some guys just love to be judged.

Read the first chapter of Someone to Build Me Up here.

Someone to Build Me Up tells the story of Zack, an English professor fresh out of a long term relationship, and Marcus, his reserved yet fascinating personal trainer. When Zack needs an emergency fake boyfriend to take to his sister's wedding, Marcus, to his surprised delight, steps up. Now, they just have to navigate their baggage, their boundaries, and eventually, their true feelings for one another.

If you like fake dating and guys who should really let themselves have nice things, this is very likely your jam.

[kimboo-york]

CHAPTER THREE ON REAM

Installments continue to be “public” for all (you’ll need a ream account, but it’s free)! After that, new installments will be “early access” for my supporters, with free chapters being released later on down the line.

THE START OF AN EPIC ADVENTURE OF MYTHS, MAGIC, AND LEGENDS BEING BORN! FEATURING A FANTASY ROAD TRIP, A SLOW-BURN MMF LOVE TRIAD, DRAGONS, AND MAGIC DOGS!!!!

The tranquil solitude of Astra’s monastic life is shattered in an instant when a brutal assault destroys the only home she has ever known. Thrown into the untamed, wild magic of the outside world, she must rely on an uneasy alliance: a charismatic thief, a suspicious warrior, an injured dragon, and two demonic dogs. Is her secret and reviled ability to communicate with the dead the key to their survival? If you enjoy sprawling, epic fantasies but think there needs to be more middle-aged women protagonist necromancers with multiple love interests and an adorable, spunky, and very contrary dragon sidekick, then you will love this story!

[marimancusi]

If you liked the tragic romance in my Frozen: Dangerous Secrets nook, you will LOVE my new serialized fantasy romance on Kindle Vella. The Forge of Silk and Steel. There are 14 episodes posted so far with on the way! (Warning: It's another tearjerker, sorry/not sorry!)

Bored of palace life, Princess Kyrenia schemes to swap places with the blacksmith's daughter, Ainslie, so the princess can joust in a tournament and the commoner can attend a royal ball. But when elves infiltrate the palace and abduct the wrong girl, Kyrenia's forced to team up with her arch rival--Ainslie's brother--on a dangerous quest to save her friend. Meanwhile Ainslie must find a way to use forbidden magic to stay alive in the hands of her arrogant, yet handsome elven captor.

Start reading Episode 1 right now! (It's free! You just need an Amazon account.) Or you can download the entire story thus far to your Kindle by searching for "The Forge of Silk and Steel."

Don't forget to hit "follow" after you read to be updated when new episodes drop!

[miyanotes]

Looking for Web Novel Writeblrs to Follow!

By “web novel,” I don’t mean the website WebNovel (which, recently, has been sending shady emails to AO3 writers). I’m simply referring to stories that are serialized online. Like longfics, but for original stories.

I’m working on my own web novel, and I’d like to find other web novel writers/aspiring writers like me.

If you’re working on a web novel, then please reblog this post with a short summary of what your story is about.

I will follow everyone who leaves a summary~

[sjstone-author]

The latest illustration that I love for my space opera series coming next year - tentatively called "Stellar Awakening", but I'm not in love with it. Maybe "Cosmic Awakening?" It's about a young genius princess who traverses the galaxy in a starship of her own creation to find and capture a long lost source of immense power. What she doesn't count on is what the source of that power actually is. She also doesn't count on falling in love.

[yeahyankee]

Creeps now officially has an audiobook companion! Episodes upload every two weeks, and you’ll be able to save, download, and listen to them here:

[newwinslowma]

New Winslow is a small town in a mostly forgotten part of Massachusetts. It's a modern paranormal story. A queer rural urban fantasy. It's a story of love and fear, of the complicated ways in which we connect with each other. It's about accepting the consequences of our choices, about how history is always intertwined with the present.

It's also an online serial, released seasonally. Originally it was supposed to be an audio drama, but that was so not in the cards.

But if you're an audio fiction fan, you might dig this too. If you're a fan of vibes and character, you might dig this. If you like Noah Kahan's brand of sad New England shit, you might dig this.

(Btw I love noah kahan but new winslow was 5 seasons in when stick season came out. So the many connections between the album and new winslow are coincidental, but in a lovely way.)

Seven seasons are already available to read as free ebooks and season eight is coming later this year. Find it on most ebook platforms, your local library, or enfield arts dot com.

So with one season to go, what better time to start promoting it on tumblr for the first time in like 5 years?

Plus I can use this for spoiler chats that might not fit so well elsewhere. And give little teasers for season 8 and side stories

[rawralittlerawr]

There are now 20 Episodes available to binge of The Event: Season One of The Portal War on Kindle Vella

Read the first three Episodes/Chapters for FREE!

The Event: Season One of The Portal War

There is really only one thing anybody can say for sure, with certainty, ten days after the OE in Egypt…No matter what happens from here on out, whether the outcome is good or bad - nothing will ever be the same for the citizens of Jericho or the eight billion people who call Earth their home. 

Episode 20 - “Easy Like Sunday Warning Part II” featuring Major Elizabeth Ames, is live! 

Science Fiction / Action and Adventure with a little fantasy and romance sprinkled in: Small Town / Aliens / Mythological Creatures and Beings / Portals / Ascension / Secret Societies and Prophecies / Second Chance-Slow Burn Romance / High Strangeness / Ancient Advanced Civilizations / Superhuman Abilities 

Strange things are happening in Jericho. When similar extraordinary reports start popping up all over the globe, a brilliant young geneticist is compelled to return to her hometown. The small town of Jericho was the tip of the iceberg, and 'The Events' are just the beginning!

[interpersonalchemistry]

“Do we have everything?” Avi asked, his hand on the open rear hatch door as he peered into the trunk. To placate him, Mitch checked his bag and confirmed that all of his medication was inside of it.

“We’re good,” he nodded. “Even if we missed anything, we can get it up there. Not like we’re going into the wilderness.”

“Alright.” Shutting the trunk, Avi turned to Mitch with crinkled eyes, looking adorable in the hat that Jodie knit for him as a Christmas gift. “So…we’re off, I guess?”