~ Welcome to Quills ~

Now that sounds like my kinda story - when you gonna post some?
I'm jealous you've seen Knowing. I want to. Maybe next week. I must be innately pessimistic (must be?!) because I seem to love these end-of-the-world things (why, I wonder, do so many Apocalypic things happen to New York in particular! *lol* Poor New Yorkers... or Los Angelenos, prolly) and have always had an inkling to write one myself - but I'm a wimp, that's why I revere those that can do it and pull it off well.

For the record I'm not really writing anything at the moment. Actually, that's not 100% true. I have been working on 2 stories, neither much chop, and have at least one major Fan Fic still yet to be completed from the former site, called simply MS (no not the gang MS-13, or the disease MS). It started off okay, but I have grown disenchanted with it's progress. I've considered deleting the last 50 pages of what I had posted before because I impulsively wrote myself into a difficult corner to get out of - and I hate the way it's ending. The basic premise is Mike (Shinoda, I know, Fanfic sh*t, bear with me) has become a powerful playerhead against the war on drugs. He has his nemesis, Chester (figures) who was once the drug baron that Mike helped to take down. Rob was the cop that did it, and along with Mike, has become something of a local hero. But he has his tragedies too. It involves a lot of players, lots of folks from LPF, me, several other bands (Disturbed, Korn, Good Charlotte and more) and has been going on for about 2 years now. The thing is I never planned any of it. I went against convention and wrote and posted without really stringing things cohesively together. It's probably not as bad as I make it seem, and I do have a few followers from it, but by and large... I am just frustrated. In hindsight I could have done so many things differently and ended up with a far better story than what I lumped myself with now... Anyway, I've been asked several times to finish it, and part of me wants to... but we'll see I guess.

The things going on here at the moment are two attempts at short stories. Short stories are my bane; I simply cannot write them. Everything has to be novel-sized - or larger! So trying to pare details down to their most basic has been the greatest opposing force I've met of late, even despite my own natural insecurities.

One is about a woman who lives in a small town. She suffers at the hands of her cheating and abusive husband. She is somewhat of a psychic, but people mock her for it, and as such she's a rather pitiful creature suffering quite a miserable existence. As the winter approaches, fog sets in. The town is somewhat iscolated. It's similar to the actual town of Bennington where people start going missing and no one has any explanations. This pitiful woman than everyone shunned now has to lead them through the fear of the unknown as more and more people start disappearing. What I'm experimenting with, on several levels, is people's reaction to fear. Not just that, but I've always been intrigued with the concept of alternate universes, 'rips' in time and space, and unexplained phenomenon. If you've ever read any of James' Herbert's earlier works (like The Dark) you'll see where my influences lay.
Anyway, it's not much, and I'm less than thrilled with what I've got - but I've got it all worked out, you know, it's just a matter of making it less... flat? Less 'choppy'? Meh, am sure I'll figure something out.

The other one is something I've also been toying with - living inside a 'cult like' community. Trying to get inside the heads of the 'leaders' and followers (look at Jim Jones' for a historical example, and David Koresh another) and basically trying to create a story from that - what life is like inside one of these organisations. What I have so far is a bit off centre, about a young couple who have moved to this newly developed housing community run by this guy. He has a legitimate face, but behind the scenes of course it's a different story, and the 'perfection' of this suburb is really just a facade for a whole lot of sinister goings on. It's probably not original either, but I'm into it in a sick kind of way. My biggest hang up, of course, is creating a whole town that isn't so 2 dimensional and stereotypical. Oh and trying to figure out what the 'cult' really stands for. I think the religious aspect is overdone - but even from a post-apocalyptical view, there would have to be that basic element of survival and societal restructure of the whole for the sake of humanity. (See Jess, told you I'd been thinking about it!)

Anyway none of any of those are finished, and I'm getting nowhere fast - especially considering I spend more time on here these days than I do anything else (besides work). If I can get my proverbial finger out, I'll try some more later and if it's progressing well I may even post something. Don't go holding your breath though, could be a while

Well, I'm not working on much really, and since I got my music too, I'm the opposite of Ravyn - I prefer writing short stories. Currently I'm working on Walk, of which I've already posted some here, and a book, which is yet to be titled.

Walk is simply a short story I started out of the need of writing something last Autumn. It's about a man who has died for an unknown cause and is now going through different kind of tribulations and testings of his Faith and goodness. Is he worth a perfect afterlife? Is it God who is controlling his path from space to space? Will the tests end or is he left wandering around a loop with no escape for eternity? Like Ravyn said, the story itself has many questions but very few answers.

The other thing I'm working on is a pretty normal teen drama-ish thingy. Two best friends both meet the girl of their dreams during the opening weekend of February, and find themselves surprised as the girls end up being transferred to the school the boys go to. The qwartet decides to form a band, and a fifth member is recruited as both of the couples break up. After this intro, the rest of the book deals with the feelings of the five as they progress from a spontanious idea to a talented group of artists.
I currently have about 60 pages written, which is shamingly little considering that I started the book last Summer. For my defense, I've been in a difficult position lately though - first I couldn't access the book at all because of my broken computer, and as of then I've written myself in a corner with the whole thing. I think I'm able to do something about it now though, I'm having a few fresh ideas.

I've also been into writing something else, really dark mainly, but haven't started anything because I want to finish the two I'm working on right now first. Like I said, I don't consider myself so much a writer anymore anyways, because now music is a much bigger part of my life.

All of your ideas sound awesome, I'd be glad to read some of them.

I haven't even written any of Tourniquet : Silence, in fact, I don't even know that "Silence" is the actual title to it. I've barely written Tourniquet : Conquest. I made over 30 chapters of Tourniquet, in which I still haven't heard anything from the publishers about, and in the process of writing Tourniquet : Conquest. But I must admit because it is a sci-fi sequel IT IS hard to sustain. Jeez, if I could, I would write out a list of definitions I made up from Tourniquet and post them on here. Yeah, I'll do just that, when I don't have to do anything real important, which should happen tomorrow morning when I wake up and realise that I've had to post pone by eye appointment to stuff for my sister. UGH. Not happy Jan. But all the more, I'll just adjust the zoom settings on my computer. To be all honest, I don't know if I really do what to make a third book to sequel to Tourniquet. But that's to be decided after I manage to finish Tourniquet : Conquest.
Ah I must admit there are some highlights to Tourniquet that I cannot forget. Chaz and his drinking ways. Those who have read it would understand. Probably the a good reason to post it here. Although that Mel and some other characters die (**SPOILER**) in Tourniquet, they didn't die in vain. I miss Mike to be all honest. Just his ways was so stern but so light-hearted at the same time.
Now in Tourniquet : Conquest I am loving Jack's character XD So far he's evil but he's charmingly evil. Sarah's cruel and is just asking for mutiny and David's just plain pyschotic! Penelope has hardly a clue of what is happening around her but she's a smart one I tell you, she catches on pretty quickly to history and all past events. The Council is like something out of a Stephan King's novel Ravy once put it, it's post-Spyral and it makes itself look perfect, when really, the reader (or so I have been told) just shakes their head at The Council not knowing who to root for really.

^Congrats!! I know how much of a pain that can be so sincerely, congrats. We (I) expect big things from you! =)