I am in the middle of puting together a piece of writing that maybe one day...hmmmm, one century more like.....will get published..

As part of any work of fiction one has to devlope the culture that is in the back ground.

The idea [ in brief] I wanted to put forward for your assessment and amusement is:

WE have an alien culture that is essential advanced human. They have learned how to achieve pseudo immortality.
To achieve this state one must spend an entire mortal existence learning how to be immortal. Failure to do so leads to death. Immortality can not be achieved by genetic or medical means and must be learned as a way of life.

So in all a person has approximately 100 years to get his physical, emotional, philosophical and intellectual act together with the aid of those who have succeeded, to attain this immortal state or die trying.....

The reason for this idea is to add a philosophical depth to the work, including Eastern esoteric , and modern western views on self, imagination etc....as a backdrop to the action aspects of the book....

Does the idea have merit do you think....?

Firstly, you must decide on the story genre; is it, a thriller, a romance, a comedy, action, drama...there has to be a genre.

Secondly, there's nothing wrong with using your above idea as a background to the main story, as long as you don't try to make it too esoteric by mixing up too much philosophy with fiction. Sure, let the philosophy come through where it has to for effect and for clarifying certain things, but make sure that it makes sense and that you have a total grasp of what you're trying to convey.

Thirdly, write the thing and have fun.

I am in the middle of puting together a piece of writing that maybe one day...hmmmm, one century more like.....will get published..

As part of any work of fiction one has to devlope the culture that is in the back ground.

The idea [ in brief] I wanted to put forward for your assessment and amusement is:

WE have an alien culture that is essential advanced human. They have learned how to achieve pseudo immortality.
To achieve this state one must spend an entire mortal existence learning how to be immortal. Failure to do so leads to death. Immortality can not be achieved by genetic or medical means and must be learned as a way of life.

So in all a person has approximately 100 years to get his physical, emotional, philosophical and intellectual act together with the aid of those who have succeeded, to attain this immortal state or die trying.....

The reason for this idea is to add a philosophical depth to the work, including Eastern esoteric , and modern western views on self, imagination etc....as a backdrop to the action aspects of the book....

Does the idea have merit do you think....?


title

"Live forever or die trying"

Sounds like a great idea :)

It's a fairly interesting concept, I must say. Specifically as an intriguing, personal-evolution alternative to the Transhumanist nonsense.

ha...

Immortality = live forever or die trying,

Actually a bit of profudity in this.....How can one claim to be immortal unitl immortality is acheieved which can not be achieved until one lives for ever but can not live forever until forever is achieved.....so the notion of immortality is flawed and must equate with "live forever or die trying".

It's a fairly interesting concept, I must say. Specifically as an intriguing, personal-evolution alternative to the Transhumanist nonsense.

Have been thinking since posting, that it is not dis similar to the notion of the Jedi in Star wars, and how ultimately they strove for similar ends.

However what I have in mind is a more material or meta - "physical" methodology.

ha...

Immortality = live forever or die trying,

Actually a bit of profudity in this.....How can one claim to be immortal unitl immortality is acheieved which can not be achieved until one lives for ever but can not live forever until forever is achieved.....so the notion of immortality is flawed and must equate with "live forever or die trying".


so when an "immortal" is on his death bed taking his last breath he utters to all in the room " Sigh!! I was immortal once!!"":D

Have you had any work published previously QQ?

Interesting background. Just don't let it snuff out the story proper...

Have you looked out http://www.nanowrimo.org/?

Have you had any work published previously QQ?
not actually published for profit no....but am forever hopeful.....:)

Interesting background. Just don't let it snuff out the story proper...

Have you looked out http://www.nanowrimo.org/?

I have now and I just love the idea of crash writing...

Isn't this just like Highlander only without the swords?

Isn't this just like Highlander only without the swords?
In Highlander they were immortal and were killing each other off so they could become mortal.

Don't forget the sordid, graphic sex scenes that all immortals engage in.

Why do you say pseudo-immortality?

As a background, it sounds fine. My next question is, what kind of story is it, as tablariddim has asked. Is it a journey through life, following someone as they make the necesary adjustments, the struggle to get into the right frame of mind despite the distractions, or is it goign to look at the effect someone failing to reach immortality has upon their friends and family, or what if they opt out of it completely yet there is social pressure to conform?
Who is your viewpoint character, or are you going for omnipotent narrator or what?

Why do you say pseudo-immortality?

As a background, it sounds fine. My next question is, what kind of story is it, as tablariddim has asked. Is it a journey through life, following someone as they make the necesary adjustments, the struggle to get into the right frame of mind despite the distractions, or is it goign to look at the effect someone failing to reach immortality has upon their friends and family, or what if they opt out of it completely yet there is social pressure to conform?
Who is your viewpoint character, or are you going for omnipotent narrator or what?

all good question and some I have no answer to as yet..
The book I am trying to write is a universal apocolyptic saga involving many sub stories and characters. It´s title is called "The center of time" and is expected to run into three volumes.

It is essentially about the desparate attempt to save a failing universe caused by an Alien time experiment gone wrong. It discusses how important humanity is in this recovery and explores humanities missing links to it´s past and how current alien myth turns out to be close to the truth.
One alien grouping is this race of immortals and I was attempting to devlope that idea that I mentioned earlier. "live forevert or die trying"...ha...sounds great.

Any way these immortals combine forces with humanity and in particular one gifted human as they unravel the dualism that maintains universal integrity to find a solution.

That one human not only has to fast track his own immortality but learn how to utilise technology and mind [ imagination] to restore the universes degrading integrity.

In the final chapters humanity has not only achieved technological superiority in the universe but also has an immortal son credited with the universes salvation.


any way that the general idea in brief.

Why do you say pseudo-immortality?
because immortality in absolutum can not ever be claimed. Accidental death, suicide, got to live forever before you can claim to be immortal sort for thing

For the immortals, you have to have a good idea of their internal social politics. Also some nice storylines could be had with simply theri sociology. What if, wehn you became an immortal, you underwent some sort of ceremony, a ritual burial, and came out the other side not socially obliged to stay with or do anything for or against your family?

How hard science is it supposed to be? An alien time experiment gone wrong will be tricky to explain away to a scientifically literate audience, without a lot of handwaving. Unless your going for what might be called more teh Ursula Le Guin market, where the science is somewhat softer, and sometimes merges into sociology.

It sounds like a good story. It will almost certainly be categorized as sci-fi, unless you write it in Spanish and win a Nobel Prize for it in which case it will be called "magic realism" because everybody knows sci-fi is not serious literature. Given the standards of the genre you actually could make the story primarily about the science and its effect on society, rather than focusing on plotting and character development. I guess that's why the elite say this is not serious literature, so screw 'em.

For the immortals, you have to have a good idea of their internal social politics. Also some nice storylines could be had with simply theri sociology. What if, wehn you became an immortal, you underwent some sort of ceremony, a ritual burial, and came out the other side not socially obliged to stay with or do anything for or against your family?

How hard science is it supposed to be? An alien time experiment gone wrong will be tricky to explain away to a scientifically literate audience, without a lot of handwaving. Unless your going for what might be called more the Ursula Le Guin market, where the science is somewhat softer, and sometimes merges into sociology.

I agree that the use of alien culture grants a sort of poetic license to how you construct a society.
There are many options and possibilities, however in this work I am intending to make the immortality issue a key to the recovery. Afterall immortality can only exist even in a pseudo sense if the universe is maintained. So deep within ther process of gaining pseudo immortality are the keys to re-achieveing the pseudo perpetuation of the universe.
Joining the spiritual with the material if you like....

As to the degree of hard science I will be devloping a concept called reflective physics that borrows from existing scientific thought but developed a new structure using currently unknown science. Maintaining logical integrity is a real challenge but of course certain beliefs and assumptions will have to be met and made.

There is also the issue of alien refugees arriving in our skies and how the planet copes with the sudden increase in demand for resources.

There are many other ideas flowing through the book so far many of which are a real challenge to put in a way that is not over whelming.....too many ideas spoils the broth so to speak....

The interesting idea I am working with is that the hero of the story actually physically does very little but mentally and emotionally does a great deal. He is the one who suffers and makes the supreme sacrifice but in doing so gains the physical, intellectual and spiritual transformation needed to peform his destiny. A not too comfortable experience for him.

Meanwhile the planet has to deal with the influx of an enourmous amount of knowledge and encrypted memories of culture already lost [ and refugees ] as the universes high tech cultures see the Earth as a place of last refuge. And send all the scientific insight they have on the problem to help find a cure. Leaving humanity at the end of this book with all the knowledge and science it could ever want.

There is no doubt I face an enourmous challenge with this book but as I am semi retired I got heaps of time to get into it.....certainly been a lot of fun so far.
And thanks for your interest, maybe as I progress you would like to give further comment? [ but don´t hold your breath I´ve been on this ambition already for nearly 2 years]

Ok, planet coping with demand for resources depends upon how advanced we are at that time. Also, if they aliens or anyone else is pretty damn advanced tech wise, resources will not be an issue. We will have the capabilities to mine the moon and asteroids in about 30 years (Thats a rough guess- we could do it now, but it woul be very expensive).

It sounds like you have given proper consideration to the story of transformation of the character, and appropriate jeopardy.
I have been writing SF and stufff for 6 years, however have yet to have antyhing published, but am nearly there in terms of quality. I have story ideas that have been in storage for several years, and I will add small comments and notes with regards to characters and technology, when I htink of them.
However, I would suggest spending more time on it, if you are semi-retired, and have been working on it for 2 years already. One of my friends started writing a novel properly about 3 years ago, and he has now edited and re-written the first few chapters to where they are ready for sending off to an agent. This is at the same time as having a full time job and family to look after.

Ok, planet coping with demand for resources depends upon how advanced we are at that time. Also, if they aliens or anyone else is pretty damn advanced tech wise, resources will not be an issue. We will have the capabilities to mine the moon and asteroids in about 30 years (Thats a rough guess- we could do it now, but it woul be very expensive).

It sounds like you have given proper consideration to the story of transformation of the character, and appropriate jeopardy.
I have been writing SF and stufff for 6 years, however have yet to have antyhing published, but am nearly there in terms of quality. I have story ideas that have been in storage for several years, and I will add small comments and notes with regards to characters and technology, when I htink of them.
However, I would suggest spending more time on it, if you are semi-retired, and have been working on it for 2 years already. One of my friends started writing a novel properly about 3 years ago, and he has now edited and re-written the first few chapters to where they are ready for sending off to an agent. This is at the same time as having a full time job and family to look after.

One of the battles is learning how to write in the first instance. Takes lots of practice and dare I say many many posts to forums such as this one...ha

Logicistical progression over three volumes is a real challenge as you can imagine. I have a white board at home that is covered with links and associations....as the various characters move through time and have subtle and direct connections.

Heros and sub heros, bad guys and conspiracy...etc.....


I have allowed the greatest resource issue to be one of liquid water.

And organic foods more than mineral resource issues.
Technology may be superior but food takes time to grow and harvest, I am not opting for the usual nano tech where by a machine spits out a fancy meal of choice from carbon fibre. Any way this area is a major development area for me as to get away from the typical deep space survival issue as most high tech races use hyperspace or quantum jumping to get to earth and have no need for long space travel survival sustanance. Also no time to prepare for their flight as refugees [ in some instances only hours available to launch.....so I intend to build in their dependancy on Earths ecco system and how they the various races of aliens restrain them selves from destroying it even though they are suffering from starvation and thirst. Keeping them off the planet except for diplomatic entities to avoid quarantine issues and given the vast number of them this poses an interesting dilemma. The moon becomes a detention center for disagreeable entities. And well.... ideas abound. A short time after the bulk of refugees arrives the ability to quantum jump is lost as at a quantum level the universe starts to be unable to provide safe passage. The quanta is loosing integrity., as the time conundrum generated by that bad experiment rapidly works its way throughout. So the refugees are stuck in Earth orbit with limited orbit to ground capacity shuttles to use.

However Earth has the solid support of the immortals and the key hero and his race must be protected at all cost. So the Earth is placed under quarantine for it and the universe self interests yet has to provide support to all those refugees.

liquid water? On earth? Are you kidding?
Clean potable water, yes, but not if we have anything like the kinds of technology that are currently in the pipeline, to do with cheaper and easier water purification.
Yes, nanotech has been oversold, you just have to have some kind of sensible problems with it. Say we never get nuclear fusion working, then energy intensive strong drexlerian nanotech assemblers would be problematic, given the amount of energy necessary to make and break bonds.

OK, that makes more sense having the universe slowly falling apart and the Earth becoming more and more isolated. It should be a very claustrophobic place.

liquid water? On earth? Are you kidding?
Clean potable water, yes, but not if we have anything like the kinds of technology that are currently in the pipeline, to do with cheaper and easier water purification.
Yes, nanotech has been oversold, you just have to have some kind of sensible problems with it. Say we never get nuclear fusion working, then energy intensive strong drexlerian nanotech assemblers would be problematic, given the amount of energy necessary to make and break bonds.

OK, that makes more sense having the universe slowly falling apart and the Earth becoming more and more isolated. It should be a very claustrophobic place.

The refugee problem is actually a relatively minor sub plot and the water problem is to do with the shere numbers of refugees and the difficulty in getting it to orbit, there simply isn´t time available to get too stuck with assembling thousands of shuttles and other infrastructure etc.

the total time span of the book is about 2 earth years. at present.

actually the sense of claustraphobia is one to work with...hmmmm....

BY taking the omni narrator perspective I have concerns about applying Earth based times to universal events but as yet I have found no easy way of getting a story out that makes sense with out using the earth hour or year....unless the omni narrator proves to be our hero...... the pseudo author therefore a pseudo auto biography. Any way that seems to be the only way to deal with the time issue with out the reader having to simply assume that Earth time is a universal standard of some sort, magic writing I think they call it.....

any ideas..... other than the pseudo auto-biography one?

WE have an alien culture that is essential advanced human. They have learned how to achieve pseudo immortality.
To achieve this state one must spend an entire mortal existence learning how to be immortal. Failure to do so leads to death. Immortality can not be achieved by genetic or medical means and must be learned as a way of life.

So in all a person has approximately 100 years to get his physical, emotional, philosophical and intellectual act together with the aid of those who have succeeded, to attain this immortal state or die trying.....Wow, I think this is actually a fantastic idea!

(And your reward for posting it on the Internet will be to have someone steal it.)

Of course, everything is in the execution. This could make a masterpiece or a piece of shit depending on characters, style, storytelling and all that good stuff.

That being said, I do think it's a great idea.

My other recommendation would be not to go overboard with the whole philosophical thing. That stuff is boring, and useless. Show, don't tell. Heavy-handed symbolism and pseudo-philosophical incantations are the best way to ruin any good story.

Ahh, well theres a problem. The water shortage is right, if your talking a few weeks. Any longer, and any half way teched up modern society in say 2050, would have large transporters ferrying water in from up solar system. The water shortage would merely be a few months long at most, and would be a good harbinger of difficulties perhaps, as well as an excuse for some characters to desperately get to earth. Which would leave htem emotionally cut up. Imagine if after 2 months of organising and building, a comet full of water is deposited in orbit, and people feel they can start to relax- except that they cannot, things are getting worse, the time effects are starting to be really noticeable. You could even have mention of time effects, but not have them as the central problem, then, say 2/3 of the way through the first book, people realise that was the minor problem. I wonder what effect it would have on readers?


You certainly dont need space shuttles to get stuff into orbit either, they are actually the most inefficient and expensive method for doing it. Just use big dumbboosters, but of course it would take quite a while to build them.

I am setting the timing to coincide with the year 2012 if I can get published before then. Do you know of the significance of 2012?

Mayan indio prophecy has major predictions for the year 2012. In fact most of the psychics and astrologists of any worth in the world are all abuz with it´s proximity.

So the Mayan prediction will also feature.....
do a quick google [prophecy Mayan ] if you don´t.....

Here is a link to one of the many web sites if people are feeling lazy.....

http://www.13moon.com/prophecy%20page.htm

This time we are now in has been called "The Time of Trial on Earth," "Judgement Day," "The Time of Great Purification," "The End of this Creation," "The Quickening," "The End of Time as We Know It," "The Shift of the Ages." It is foretold that the completion of the Precession brings regeneration of Earth, offering awakening to all open, willing hearts. Many peoples spoke of these last days of the Great Cycle, including the: Maya, Hopi, Egyptians, Kabbalists, Essenes, Qero elders of Peru, Navajo, Cherokee, Apache, Iroquois confederacy, Dogon Tribe, and Aborigines.

from above mentioned link....

Yes yes, the fucking Mayans got it right, blah blah...
I'm a bit bored with people predicting the end of the world etc. Its probably just a translation mistake.

As for 2012, if you want it for then, your going to have to finish it in the next couple of years. Otherwise it will look really dated and a bit naff. I know an SF author who is writing a near future novel, and getting worried by the way that the news keeps cathing up on what he is predicting in 6 or 8 years time.
If you put it in 2012 then our technooogy will still be pretty poor. Physics is getting along, but there are quite a few fundamentla problems that we'll only be beggining to get a handle on by then.

I am in the middle of puting together a piece of writing that maybe one day...hmmmm, one century more like.....will get published..

As part of any work of fiction one has to devlope the culture that is in the back ground.

The idea [ in brief] I wanted to put forward for your assessment and amusement is:

WE have an alien culture that is essential advanced human. They have learned how to achieve pseudo immortality.
To achieve this state one must spend an entire mortal existence learning how to be immortal. Failure to do so leads to death. Immortality can not be achieved by genetic or medical means and must be learned as a way of life.

So in all a person has approximately 100 years to get his physical, emotional, philosophical and intellectual act together with the aid of those who have succeeded, to attain this immortal state or die trying.....

The reason for this idea is to add a philosophical depth to the work, including Eastern esoteric , and modern western views on self, imagination etc....as a backdrop to the action aspects of the book....

Does the idea have merit do you think....?

Hate to be a critic, especially of ideas, but when I read your premis it reminded me of us, the people of Earth. It has definite religious overtones, the 100 year development stage, not out of the range of an average lifespan for advanced humans but it sounds too much like man assembling a soul in order to transition into an eternal life. Spending a lifetime learning to be immortal is too much like the present day religious society, learn the path to righteousness and be immortalized in heaven. Only instead of ethereal beings adrift in heavenly bliss your subjects are flesh and blood. OK but I find it hard to believe immortality will be attained without any help from science. Sorry but the story is an embellishment of what's already happening. Just how I see it, same old, not to say no one would be interested

Hate to be a critic, especially of ideas, but when I read your premis it reminded me of us, the people of Earth. It has definite religious overtones, the 100 year development stage, not out of the range of an average lifespan for advanced humans but it sounds too much like man assembling a soul in order to transition into an eternal life. Spending a lifetime learning to be immortal is too much like the present day religious society, learn the path to righteousness and be immortalized in heaven. Only instead of ethereal beings adrift in heavenly bliss your subjects are flesh and blood. OK but I find it hard to believe immortality will be attained without any help from science. Sorry but the story is an embellishment of what's already happening. Just how I see it, same old, not to say no one would be interested

No doubt what you are refering to was in many ways part of the inspiration.

I have often been critical of how we humans seem to spend a life time investing in our deaths. True not an original idea...ha...been going on for thousands of years yes?

The idea was though, as Theoryofrelativity quite clearly put it..."live forever or die trying" although my words were similar hers were more bell ringing....hmmmm..."attain this immortal state or die trying....." vs " live forever or die trying"

I thought the idea had a significant touch of ironic humour and that is what attracted me to thinking on it.

However may be it´s a bit tooo "swarmy" and sweet and needs a little acid and sour-ness. So I am working on a way of adding to it some imperfection or some sort of serious negative to challenge the reader, a secret to be revealed maybe at the end of the book sort of thing...the actual ongoing cost of immortality or something like that.

Wow, I think this is actually a fantastic idea!

(And your reward for posting it on the Internet will be to have someone steal it.)

Of course, everything is in the execution. This could make a masterpiece or a piece of shit depending on characters, style, storytelling and all that good stuff.

That being said, I do think it's a great idea.

My other recommendation would be not to go overboard with the whole philosophical thing. That stuff is boring, and useless. Show, don't tell. Heavy-handed symbolism and pseudo-philosophical incantations are the best way to ruin any good story.

Thanks for the compliments. And yes the idea on it´s own does not make a book, in fact you could organise a writing competition based on the theme. "ok guys 5000 words in 30 days "live forever or die trying" time starting .....now!!" Have your words immortalised in print, so that it sits on a library shelf for the rest of eternity and never get´s read.:)

My other recommendation would be not to go overboard with the whole philosophical thing. That stuff is boring, and useless. Show, don't tell. Heavy-handed symbolism and pseudo-philosophical incantations are the best way to ruin any good story.

The trick as always is in the balance and intention. I think philosopy can be great reading if it is easy and clear and decriptive and not heavy with linguistic gymnastics.

Rememeber Grasshopper from the Kung-Fu series of TV programs. sort of thing or the philosophical reference made in most sci fi movies.

Like in the sci fi movie Serenity, regarding population control and playing God.

The showing of philosophy rather than the talking of philosophy makes perfect sense.

Also as one person recently put it to me "...... do you want to entertain or Teach?...."

I am in the middle of puting together a piece of writing that maybe one day...hmmmm, one century more like.....will get published..

As part of any work of fiction one has to devlope the culture that is in the back ground.

The idea [ in brief] I wanted to put forward for your assessment and amusement is:

WE have an alien culture that is essential advanced human. They have learned how to achieve pseudo immortality.
To achieve this state one must spend an entire mortal existence learning how to be immortal. Failure to do so leads to death. Immortality can not be achieved by genetic or medical means and must be learned as a way of life.

So in all a person has approximately 100 years to get his physical, emotional, philosophical and intellectual act together with the aid of those who have succeeded, to attain this immortal state or die trying.....

The reason for this idea is to add a philosophical depth to the work, including Eastern esoteric , and modern western views on self, imagination etc....as a backdrop to the action aspects of the book....

Does the idea have merit do you think....?

It has merit, the difficulty is in finding a publisher.

THink about a publisher after you've got it mostly written.
If you want to go for the commercial route first, you'll need to get an agent- no reputable publishers of SF take random mauscripts. It is the agents job to winnow the thousands of wannabees down to two or three promising authors. (I'm not joking about the thousands)
Or you can just vanity publish, or sell it as an e-book. That'll get it out there, but you wouldnt get quite the same satisfaction as watching it sell purely on its own merits as a readable story.

THink about a publisher after you've got it mostly written.
If you want to go for the commercial route first, you'll need to get an agent- no reputable publishers of SF take random mauscripts. It is the agents job to winnow the thousands of wannabees down to two or three promising authors. (I'm not joking about the thousands)
Or you can just vanity publish, or sell it as an e-book. That'll get it out there, but you wouldnt get quite the same satisfaction as watching it sell purely on its own merits as a readable story.

It depends I guess on what the motivation is.

I do recall doing some research that confirms your publisher agent appraisal. It seems that getting published can also be a large financial investment as well. Publishers are not as prepared to speculate financially on an unknown author as they use to.

From what I found it appears that even the large publising houses rarely fully sponser a new author into print...

Given the sheer numbers of aspiring authors it seems more a lottery than one based on merit.

So, e-book or personal e-book publishing may be the go. Certainly the cheapest in up front cash. [ Build and create my own e-book website. and charge for admission to read off the site or download the book.... have allready doen some trials using other materials]

It does seem to be the route of publishing in the future...

However the satisfaction of seeing your own book in a hard cover on good quality paper can not be underestimated....such a buz

But e-publishing certainly has advantages too, especially as you can publish pictures, graphics and diagrams and even music to support the writting so it depends I guess...just a change in attitude and approaches

imagine a 2000 slide power point exhibition......hmmmmmm....ughhhh!!

I'm summarising what i've learnt off a couple of published authors and my friend who wants to be a published author. I don't know all the details, but trust me, the market for books is very competitive.
One way to get into it is to write short stories- nmagazines are usually more open to new people with stories. But that requires time to build up a bit of a reputation. Then once you have a reputation from a few stories in magazines, you can send stuff off to agents saying "Hi, I'm X, would you like to lookat my novel. I have had several stories published in [reputable short story magazine]."

But the key thing is to write a fair bit of the book first, having decided upon roughly the audience you are pitching it at. I would be willing to have a look at a few chapters if you like, give them a bit of a going over.

You should write your book and eat is too.

I'm summarising what i've learnt off a couple of published authors and my friend who wants to be a published author. I don't know all the details, but trust me, the market for books is very competitive.
One way to get into it is to write short stories- nmagazines are usually more open to new people with stories. But that requires time to build up a bit of a reputation. Then once you have a reputation from a few stories in magazines, you can send stuff off to agents saying "Hi, I'm X, would you like to lookat my novel. I have had several stories published in [reputable short story magazine]."

But the key thing is to write a fair bit of the book first, having decided upon roughly the audience you are pitching it at. I would be willing to have a look at a few chapters if you like, give them a bit of a going over.
Thanks for the offer. Though I will have to wait till I get back home from a vacation, family reuniion [where I am typing this post...In Brazil but reside in Australia ] before I Can access my files, and I am not sure they are ready for any serious criticism yet, Although I have published excerpts at various writer web sites for critique in the past...

HHmm, interesting, so what kind of critiscism did you recieve from peopel on the writers websites? Good/ bad/ helpful/ not helpful?

HHmm, interesting, so what kind of critiscism did you recieve from peopel on the writers websites? Good/ bad/ helpful/ not helpful?

I think most of the criticism is from persons not unlike myself who had or have little writing expereince and went to these sites to get contructive criticism and hopefully some genuine praise, however most of these sites require at least 5 critiques to be writted for every story you offer.
The critiques have to be a certain number of words and actually if you take it seriously can be a real time burden.
So most citiques are more about filling a quota than genuine interest as most writers are only interested in their own work. Vanity playing up big time....

However on some occassions you will get a genuine critique, usually someone who has just arrived at the site or someone who has a keen interest in writing useful criitques but I am afraid this is not common. Out of approx 50 critiques that I recieved on one work only 2 or 3 were of real value or serious and genuine.

After sifting through all the BS I found some value and took note of what was said. I had lots to learn about writing but ideas were good, sort of critiques.

I must admit I read some stuff that was really good but would never make it into print for various reasons and I read some stuff that was excellent work in progress and looked forward to the next draft. Some of the hard sci fi was good and so was the pseudo stuff. Originality is hard to find as most writers seem to be heavily inspired by movies and the like but hey... who isn´t.

Like most things on the internet you have to be diligent about what you accept as valuable and what is not and these sites are no exception.

UNfortnately my favourite sites both closed down their short story sections and I have yet to find any others, other than Critters.com and due to time restraints I haven´t actually posted anything yet.

There might be a writers group near you in real life, you know. I'm a member of one, and its been very good for my writing.

There might be a writers group near you in real life, you know. I'm a member of one, and its been very good for my writing.
Probably but not that close, like maybe 30-40 minutes by car sort of close...

BTW Guthrie have you got anything you care to have read either posted in this thread or send by e-mail or what ever.....am interested.....

Have started a thread in free thoughts : write an opening - for wannabe writers
http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=60001

if you are interested

Maybe. I am rather wary about putting stuff that I might like to publish up on the internet though, I believe it might affect copyright and payment issues later on. As well as mailing it to complete strangers...

(Yes, I know I suggested you could send me some stuff- Of course I know I'm a real, honest bloke, but you have to take care.)

I wrote a book 3 years ago, sort of sci fi meets love story. It never got published. I would like to write one again but I haven't got around to it. Look out for me "John Chatha"

Chatha, you should go and find a publisher if you've all ready written the book. No use just keeping it there for nor eason.

I want to write a new book, but where the hell am I going to find the time..

wooo go for it dude!!!!

once u'v set ur mind to it it'll just flow on the page....

supposedly...

i got about 12 pages into my story and am now stuck!!!

but its a gud 12 pages i tell ya!!! hahahaha!!!

Loadsa luck to u!!

xxx