Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote...

I'm a quarter of the way to my desired word count for the day. Now just waiting for the work day to be over so I can get back to it.

As always, the times I can't write -- due to being busy, or due to feeling blocked -- are the times I get the most ideas.

So here's the latest plot bunny of the first days of summer. The Athena Fox Chronicles.

I thought of this before when KDP had this great idea about serialized fiction. Which didn't work out. And I've been working this past couple of weeks to push the social media marketing.

Turns out KDP has turned off the feature that let you put a preview widget on your blog. Still works on Facebook, though, so perhaps I'll finally get around to sprucing up my Facebook page.

Explored options for what is sometimes called Pocket Book (a trademark which has gone generic now), or Mass Market Paperback; the 4.25" x 7" format that fit into those wire racks you still see at airports (if nowhere else). Since I was a little kid reading science fiction I wanted to see my name on one of those covers. The larger Trade Paperback just doesn't feel "real" in the same way.

IngramSpark has that as a trim option. Probably not worth it just yet but if I do manage to get The Tiki Stars finished I'll bring that out in that format first. Just for the effect.

Anyhow, thought about posting excerpts on FaceBook and whatever else works. This blog gets about 250 hits a page so even if those mostly human, not bots, it isn't going to do much for my sales. And pretty much nobody sees the author's webpage I set up. I do need to spruce up my Amazon Author page at some point, though.

And thinking about excerpts reminded me of the thought of doing a set of shorter stories. Which, since the serial outlets turned out not to work that well, would be packaged in a single omnibus.

Originally the thought was to do some of the germs that didn't feel like they'd expand into a full novel.

But the better thought could be that these are explicitly presented as written by Penny, back when she was putting out scripts for that college video she did.

Which is to say, license to grab on to all the crazy fun that comes with letting go of strict historical realism. Or realism, generally. And the sop to my conscious is the framing story where older-and-wiser Penny apologizes for her college-age self and lists a few of the more egregious errors.

But write them as straight-up serious adventure stories.

Honestly, I posted today because I thought I'd jot down a few ideas and I didn't feel like opening the Scrivener series home file to do it. But right now nothing is jumping out. I'd like it to be a mix of oldies-but-goodies, and bizarre stuff that might be hot in the news but in any case not as many people have heard of.

And take the chance to put Athena Fox (because this would be that character fully realized, not a student cosplaying her), into places and situations I don't think I could do a proper job on in any realistic story. Like crashed flying saucers at the South Pole, or undersea cities, or.... well, why not do some period pieces too, while I'm at it?

But since none of those ideas are coming to mind right at the moment, I'll go ahead and start a new Scrivener home file and...try not to dilute my excitement by writing too much down now.

***

And I've got the first one. "The Stone Tape." Someone invents a "psychometric amplifier" -- riffing off Tom Swift's "Electronic Retroscope" as well as Nigel Keane's scripted BBC production and similar ideas used in the same author's Quatermass, specifically "Quatermass and the Pit." And the particularly invasive haunting in what is considered the worst X-Files episode filmed (the "Face on Mars" one).

Which underlines that the problem with both casual writing and well-trodden paths is you end up with trite and often-done ideas. But still sounds like a fun situation to build an adventure around. The focus could be on the psychic activity itself, the haunting so to speak, or on historical mysteries unveiled in the process. Or in the excuse to unleash a particular past on the present day -- perhaps a psychically resurrected Pharaoh? Or...just to both get to play with Victorian London and the Penny Dreadfuls, but to bring back something a little more obscure, Spring-Heel Jack!