cornerofmadness

Also write-everyday people can comment with their word count on this post

And Happy birthday to

dragonydreams. Hope it was a great one.

And L'shanah tovah to all my friends who celebrate it.

So, this came up on Queer Sci-Fi this week, the idea that it's all be done before. What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 1:9 . Given how old the source of this quote it, it's been true for a LONG time.

It falls to the author then to come up with something new....ish. We need to find a new twist to present old material and make it look fresh. It can be done. It can even be done well. It is not always easy, mind you. And there is no way you can please everyone with your new take. That's impossible of course. Some things feel very played out, at least to me. Other things will seem that way to you.

Right now if the blurb mentions she was raised by assassins/thieves, I keep right on scrolling past. You really have to convince me a dystopia is worth my time. For others, if they see another vampire/werewolf story they're sure they'll scream. Whole subgenres are built on these tropes (looking at you cozy mysteries).

So how do you work out your new take on an old theme? Read. Do it a lot. Many authors far more successful than me have espoused the idea that you can't write well if you don't read. I've seen people get pissed off about but me, I'll defer to their experience. How can you know what's being done if you don't read?

But for me one of the biggest thing is to talk to the readers in your genre. If you've spent more five minutes on line, you've probably found at least one group of like minded people. ASK them. I've done this twice in the last two weeks and came up with more ideas than I can use, and most of them I've not seen done.

There's a big pool of sameness out there. You need to stand out. Sometimes it doesn't work. If Soldiers of the Sun is any indication historical readers don't want urban fantasy and vice versa. I've seen vampires in space which doesn't work for me personally. Blood sucking aliens, sure, Stoker-esque vampires not so much. I've yet to read a goodreview or amazon review page where there has been a book that hasn't had some 1 or 2 star reviews. They might be lonely in a sea of four and five star ones but they're there, proving the point you can't please everyone.

I finished the very rough draft of my first chapter of the anime con love story. Anyone want to look it over?

Day One Tally

cornerofmadness - 185 words

kiramaru7 - 795 words

plaid_slytherin 3800 words (now that's the way to edit!)

esteliel - editing exchange fic (hope the reveals go great)

trobadora - 4600 words!!

navaan - 1500 words

auroracloud - 1000 words (on a new story!)

afrozenflower - 550 words

Day two - 175 words, just coming in dribbles