Snobstoppers!

I love storytelling, in all its forms, but some people are quick to dismiss entire swathes of incredible writing and performing based solely on their genre, setting or medium. I am writing a series of articles just for you. I will make a case for a number of much maligned or often dismissed storytelling settings and methods, explain how they can defy the expectations and assumptions you have and point to shining examples.

There is no excuse for being a snob. If something isn’t to your taste then that’s fine but please stop and look at it before ruling it out completely.

You are in good company: I am a snob too. My bugbear is literature that wins awards: I assume it to be boring, pedestrian and unimaginative. As I post these articles you will spot me being snooty. So I lay down the gauntlet: just as I intend to change your view, change mine. There’s a comments section – use it!

We’ve all been missing out on great stories. Not anymore!

Read the first of the Snobstoppers - Anime - now!

Snobstoppers: Anime

It’s Saturday morning. Someone turns on the TV. Shrill voices pierce the air. Characters with bright pink and blue hair shout about friendship and throw cute monsters at one another. You groan. Who would ever want to watch something like that?

Anime (Japanese animation): Giant robots, large-eyed critters, exaggerated voices and facial expressions. Lurid colours and puerile humour; it’s designed to please little kids. That’s what you’re thinking? You may have seen the adult side of the coin: objectified women, glorified violence, completely crazy fan base. If you’re thinking anime is any of these things: you’re right.

Finally... and with big updates!

So it has been forever and a fortnight since I last posted here. Various factors, including the procrastination that gave this blog its name, mean I did very little writing in 2012.

But I'm back, and in very unexpected ways! This is a bumper update containing none of what I promised in my last post so long ago, but many interesting things.

Firstly: I have compiled all my writings from the site, plus a few others into an ebook, available for free right here (alternate formats on request):

The Procrastinaria (mobi) (html)

There's some fairly dark and personal stuff in there mixed with the usual light stuff, and even the first chapter of a novel... so enjoy!

I have also co-authored and co-run an online, text-based role playing game this year based on a brilliantly complicated series of games called Zero Escape.

Any number of high-level science, science fiction and para-psychological elements combine into highly complex mysteries and stories in these games all centred around a game of life and death called the "Nonary Game".

I had a great time with this: I love world building and developing complex mysteries!

My partner in crime copied the content of the various forum threads (hence the formatting) and Google docs together into a series of docs in the proper order so it can be read as a whole.

If you have no knowledge of the originals: spoiler warning. If you have, or will never play either game (shame on you!) then feel free to browse, I hope you enjoy it:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9

There is currently a sequel in the works and a couple of pieces of art based on our original game, which will be posted later!

I have some ideas for more projects for The Procrastinarium, so look forward to it!

Prosaic: Dairy Dependent Detective

I'm having a bad week, so no follow up to last week's article yet. Instead - here's an old Prosaic story, and it's one of my favourites. Thanks to my godfather this is possibly the weirdest set of story ingredients yet. Late at night when I couldn't sleep, somehow the story became even stranger than the sum of its parts...

How not to use your super-powers

Honestly I’m a bit of a snob about books. If it wins some important “grown-up” award then I judge it. I assume it must be pretentious. Like modern art, I often feel that those which get the most attention in newspapers and awards, are lazy and often following a pattern. I’m rarely surprised or engaged by these types of books. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, for example, was tedious and felt like it was trying too hard. Admittedly my fondness for action and activity throwing a story forward may have something to do with it, but then again I am a man who enjoyed reading Pride and Prejudice!

Failures aren't fun!

I don't like this story. I wanted to tell a sort of fairy tale, but it comes off as twee and a little crass. The advantage of these writing experiments is that they can give me an opportunity to explore new styles or silly ideas. That's potentially great fun, but sometimes I'll come out with something like this.

Failure is instructive. I can look at this story and see how the characterisation doesn't build and how little fantastical elements pop in out of nowhere. That's a problem, and it comes from trying to write a short story based on the Grimm model and fairy tale style.

That doesn't change how annoyed it makes me! Of course, maybe you feel differently. I still feel like there was the start of a good idea in here somewhere...

The best reason to write

This was the story that reminded me how much fun writing can be. After years at school studying English for comprehension and being forced to read awfully self-indulgent Carol Ann Duffy poetry, I'd lost the joy of storytelling. 

After the first rush of enthusiasm I also had to realise that some things work better as a short story. I built a world and planned out a novel's storyline that began with this as a first chapter. In the end though, it said nothing more than I'd already said, less really was more. Of course, that didn't change how much I enjoyed writing this short story.

Ultimately, this idea was just too much fun to pass up!