A Question: A novel set in the future

[Curiose]

I have been writing this science fiction novel in the form of a blog so that I can get feedback. It's based on the direction that technology is progressing on a whole, but in a "distant" future when we basically Ray Kurzweil got his way, but it didn't turn out exactly how he predicted.

Chapter 1

Please let me know what you guys think... if you like it, or if it gives you any ideas ;)

 

[Stephen Tashi]

Are you are writing a novel or writing a plot line for a novel? In a novel, the characters should "speak for themselves" - i.e. there should be extensive dialog - which can be internal dialog. Long expository passages are often boring - - "Bob did ...thus-and-so while his such-and-such..." or "The frozen lake glistened with ...". It would be more interesting to hear Bob thinking about what he did or commenting about the frozen lake.

Of course, in contradiction to my dogma, there are some writers who perform the feat of holding our attention while giving long expository passages I'm not sure how they manage it. If you intend to try, I suggest you study writers like P. D. James or Guy de Maupassant. Generally speaking, they have the knack of writing long expository passages in a context that doesn't cause the reader to wonder what was said or what was thought.

 

[Curiose]

Well, the problem with this specific writing is that it's set in a future when people pretty much stop talking to each other... They communicate only with thought, over their version of the internet... which is mostly images, feelings, etc.

Here's Chapter 3... in the beginning of the book chapters are a bit jumpy from character to character.

Chapter 3: Dot's World

My biggest challenge has been trying to convey communication without using dialogue or questions. It's been super hard. I will check out P.D James and Guy de Maupassant.

Thanks for the reply!

 

[Stephen Tashi]

Well, the problem with this specific writing is that it's set in a future when people pretty much stop talking to each other... They communicate only with thought, over their version of the internet... which is mostly images, feelings, etc.

In some writing, there is a person presenting the story ,a narrator who has his own personality and comments on the events. You might try that approach if all the characters must be mute.

 

[Curiose]

In some writing, there is a person presenting the story ,a narrator who has his own personality and comments on the events. You might try that approach if all the characters must be mute.

Great idea, thanks! I will try this method. Maybe the narration is someone who outlived the entire era of time the story took place in. I am already referring to pretty much everything in past omnipresent third person.

Ooh, maybe the Narrator is a machine artifact which holds digital historic records in some sort of crystal memory device, but the machine itself has a personality and ability to communicate the history through spoken word.

Did you read Dot's World? I try to paint a picture, but I try to balance between description and action.

 

[Stephen Tashi]

Did you read Dot's World?

Yes. I find it boring. Of course, I'm not into computer games or fantasy scenarios.

I try to paint a picture, but I try to balance between description and action.

The trouble is that I can think of Dot as a figure in of one those computer-graphic generated action/adventure videos. She has no particular personality. There is "action" in the chapter, but there is no reason for the reader to take it seriously. Most the of action appears to be imaginary action. It soon ceases to startle,

There are some works of art that aren't meant to hold the attention of the audience. (I've heard that an avante guard composer wrote a symphony made up entirely of rests.) If you are writing that sort of abstract "literary exercise" then I don't know how to criticize it constructively.

If you are writing with the normal purpose in mind (to hold the reader's attention) the following plan won't work: "I've visualized a really neat future world - or past world -or new technology etc. I'll document it by writing a story." As literature, documentation is boring. (- or perhaps you yourself enjoy reading documentation for proposed computer games?)

 

[Curiose]

Thanks Stephen. What do you suggest as far as learning character building? I would look at google, but on things like this, I prefer interacting with people overr just looking stuff up.

It is definitely the second. It's not necessarily that I want to document a technology, if not, show how it affects us as humans... but at a human level, with proper stories, to get readers to relate to the characters. I feel like I don't know what I'm getting myself into, lol! I have 0 experience writing novels. I've written some short stories for school when I was younger.

The first chapters are supposed to be introductory chapters to different story lines. I definitely need to grab and keep the readers attention from the very first chapter through the rest of the introductions and the "world introduction" part. Should I focus more chapters on each personality instead of skipping to another person in every chapter?

I feel like there is too much technology to explain because the world is so different from the one we live in... but there's definitely got to be a balance between me "explaining" and "storytelling"

 

[Stephen Tashi]

My opinions:

Don't invent characters - use the one's you already have.. Use people you know - or use bits and pieces of them - combine parts of different people you know into one person if convenient. You can even write about a character that is a satire of yourself.

The "balance" between explaining a future world and storytelling should be a total imbalance in favor of storytelling. The environment of a story is not a crucial feature. Yes, many popular literary works are associated with particular environments ( e.g. various sci-fi works, with various future words and. Sherlock Holmes stories with Victorian England ). However, what makes such stories hold our attention is not the environment. You could move the western "High Noon" to a sci-fi setting and still have a good story. You could probably move "The Hound of the Baskervilles" to the wild west and still get something out of it. If a major goal is to present a picture of a particular future environment, you're all set to write documentation, but not to write a story.

Unlike documentation, fiction does not require giving the reader comprehensive background knowledge before things start happening. Part of what holds a readers attention is guessing or inferring what's going on. In sci-fi this is often done by having characters mention some undefined thing (e.g. a "blurr spout") and the reader only gradually figures out what it means.

 

[Curiose]

The environment of a story is not a crucial feature.

Thinking in real life, I totally understand that from traveling. After living in a number of places around the world for different periods of time, I realized that the people I meet are what forms my opinion about the place.

To re-iterate what you said in "my own words": instead of worrying about describing the place, let the readers slowly discover the properties of the settings through experiencing the story through the characters.

I definitely have my work cut out for me!

Thanks again!

 

[stefan r]

...
Ooh, maybe the Narrator is a machine artifact which holds digital historic records in some sort of crystal memory device, but the machine itself has a personality and ability to communicate the history through spoken word...

Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson did a great job of that. Ship is both narrator and a character.

 

[Curiose]

Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson did a great job of that. Ship is both narrator and a character.

Just got my next reading assignment ;)