Half-Orcs and Spellslingers

I had forgotten how much I enjoy High Fantasy. During Camp NaNoWriMo I decided to write some short stories to work towards my word count goal (spoiler: I didn’t make it). One of those stories was about a half-orc half-dwarf lady, and I kind of love it. Usually I try to keep my fantasy a bit more subdued and grounded (to an extent), but I decided to go all out with this and have angry gods and elves flinging fireballs at each other. Honestly I think it’s awesome and have been having a lot of fun with it. So much so that I’d like to turn it into a series. 

I’ve starting thinking about the worldbuilding elements and how the characters fit into that world. I don’t want the fantasy races to be carbon copies of those seen in other stories, but I still want them to have certain recognizable elements (like orcs being big burly tusked brutes). I’m also a sucker for magic systems, even the vague ones, because it always bugs me when the limits of a character’s powers aren’t communicated to the audience. If a wizard can melt steel with their fireballs, I want to know it and not have it contradicted later on for no reason. My goal is for this story to have something in between, a system that lets you know its limits but doesn’t outline every little detail and has some wiggle room to bend the guidelines.

So far there are gray skinned orcs, vagabond elves, and beetle-like bug people. The current draft takes place in a large city that has a varied mix of all these peoples. I think it's a good starting point that I can build outward from. 

Maybe it'll be a series of short stories (or novelettes), each dealing with different aspects of the world. It might not see the light of day anytime soon, but I’ll keep you posted on how it’s going. Who knows, maybe in a little while I’ll be able to share a story based in this new world.   

Flash Fic and Brain Ooze

I’ve been racking my brain over flash fiction the last couple of weeks. The idea of getting a full story in 500 words makes my brain all snotty and oozy. So, I was pretty happy when my submission to 365 Tomorrows was accepted. It’s a cyberpunk story titled Shutters on Main, and it leans pretty heavy on some neo-noir themes. You can read it here.

Peeling away the excess fat of a story to try and get to the most import core elements is something that I’m still getting used to. I have to say though, I’ve been having a lot of fun writing flash fic (how much if it sees the light of day is another matter). 

My guidelines have been to try and tell a full story in 300-500 words. That means it has to be as lean and efficient as possible. I’m far from mastering it, but there are already things I’m learning that I hope will benefit my long form writing. It feels a little more like an instinct than a technical skill, like I’m getting better at sniffing out unwanted fat and cutting it from the draft. 

There is still a long way to go, but I like to think of this as a positive step forward.