Converging Fates Ten
Year Evolution
Converging
Fates is the sum of my childhood imagination and being bored at a summer job.
Like many children, I thought dinosaurs were the coolest thing since Jesus. My
friend and I decided to create the fourth Jurassic Park movie, and we did
legitimately believe it would be the fourth Jurassic Park movie.
Plot
template: crazy scientist doing crazy things; marines search for him on islands
and fight dinosaurs. So a sci-fi channel original. In high school, this became
a semi-original novel that I worked on infrequently. At one point, I was about
75% done. I still have some of that manuscript, and the writing is horrible. I
used so many big words, convoluted sentences, and unnecessary obfuscation. I
think some English professors would love it.
After I
graduated, I worked full-time in a battery-recycling plant for the summer. My
ultra-engaging job was to sort alkaline and nickel-hydrate batteries from
nickel-cadmium. To prevent myself from lapsing into a coma, I worked on story
ideas. I liked the concept of making my own fantasy universe, and I had a
premise.
The big
epic fantasies, LOTR, Narnia, Game of Thrones are all medieval settings. More so, there seems to
be no technological progress. The
Silmarillion covers thousands of years with no mentioning of the elves or
men inventing anything. Narnia covers
the entire history of a world, with the same lack of progress. I love
science-fiction, and I love fantasy, so I decided to put them together and
place the classic fantasy races in a futuristic setting. However, I needed a
plot and villain.
I had the
idea of a teenager from earth getting swept to another reality and live with
hyper-aggressive elves, but that was it. I needed a focal point, and the
Jurassic Park story was perfect. There was a villain, a plot, and action. There
were exciting characters and transferable characters. A stoic marine male
colonel easily became Vanyae. Tyrannosaurus Rex became the hydra.
For some
reason, I was oddly motivated to work on this story. I wrote almost every day
after work, and once college started, my ability to do very little and get
decent grades proved most useful. Positive
feedback from my friend encouraged me that I had something good. I've read that
it's bad to show stories to your friends, because they'll give bias feedback.
Maybe for short stories, but I wouldn't read a full novel on Open Office if I
didn't really like it, and I don't think any of my friends would either.
I finished
the manuscript in about six months. I had done three rewrites, which I believed
was enough. I would talk about my query rejection process, but since I never
got an agent, I don't really know what I was doing wrong.
I went back
to the manuscript several times over the next two years. A month before I
signed a contract, I finished the biggest rewrite, reducing the story by almost
20,000 words while expanding on description.
In previous
rewrites, I only made minimal alterations. I felt that my story was complete
and thus, there should be no major changes. You can't really be right or wrong
in writing, but I think that after two years, I had developed enough as a
writer, and I had enough of rejection, to realize major changes were
beneficial.
Some of the
things I removed will be making appearances later on: some character
flashbacks, some origin myths, and a completely deleted significant character.
However, they unnecessarily complicated this story and unbalanced the pacing.
The lessons
I take from this: childhood is really important, but for some reason, it's
often ignored. Go to a famous person's Wikipedia page, their childhood section
will be very small, but I had a wonderful imagination then, and I don't see any
reason to waste those ideas. Next, don't convince yourself your manuscript doesn't
need major changes just because you declared it finished. There's never really
a time when it's actually done (as the notes in my copy of CF testify to), but
don't let it be too easy for you to stop major revisions.
July 15 Guest blog
Cloey's Book Reviews and Other Stuff
July 15 Spotlight
Cover Reveals
July 16 Spotlight
DEB SANDERS
July 16 Interview
Pembroke Sinclair.
July 17 Guest blog
Unraveling Words
July 18 Spotlight
Brooke Bumgardner
July 19 Guest blog
July 22 Guest blog
Fang-tastic Books
July 22 Spotlight
The Creatively Green Write at Home Mom
Converging Fates
Reagent Universe, Book 1
Jonathan Cortez
Genre: Science-Fiction
Publisher: Fresh Publishing
Date of Publication: 03 June 2013
ISBN: 9780957606814
ASIN: 0957606818
Number of pages: 376 p
Word Count: 133,750 words
Cover Artist: Jen Detchon
Book Description:
Deep in the remote Undervalley, a scientist is creating a portal that will link two universes.
Never mind the damage his research does. A taskforce of elves and humans must hunt him down before he destroys their universe.
The elves hold the key, Mahavir, a human abducted from the other universe. He is the link between universes, and his death may prevent a disaster.
But Mahavir has no intention sacrificing himself for others.
Jonathan Cortez is a graduate of Penn State Behren, with an Associate of Arts degree.
He was an avid reader and writer from a young age, but even before that his story-telling and world-building skills blossomed while playing with Lego. He largely developed his writing craft on his own.
Jonathan is a big fan of science-fiction and fantasy, although he only started reading the genres during high school. When not reading or writing, he enjoys watching TV and listening to heavy metal.
He is currently still studying at Penn State. He is also working on the sequel to Converging Fates.
1 comment:
Thank you for hosting me, and thanks for the whole tour. It was a pleasant virtual experience.
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