So, I managed to get caught up on the latest episodes. The one in the title, however, is the one I'm going to be focusing on. As such, everything will be under the cut to avoid spoiling things for those who haven't seen it.
First and foremost, I absolutely loved the way they set up the tone and atmosphere of the episode. They were not lying when they called it 'Horror Club'. The writers and storyboard artists did a fantastic job of making it all feel like a horror movie, and allowed the audience to get immersed even when they suspected that a gem was the true cause of the situation.
They all got together to watch a movie, one called Evil Bear 2 (and if that wasn't an homage to Five Nights At Freddy's, I don't know what it is). By they, I mean Lars, Sadie, Steven, and Reinaldo, with all of them hanging out at Reinaldo's place.
Originally, Lars didn't want to go with Steven, but once he saw that Sadie was going with him, Lars decided to join, having already expressed to Steven how little he wanted to be near Reinaldo.
Partway through the movie, the lights go out, and things start to get eerie. My favorite part, however, was when the group tried to leave the house and was attacked by possessed scarecrows.
As Sadie and Reinaldo attempt to close the door, one of the scarecrows slips in through the cracks and attacks Lars. Lars, I believe, survived by sheer luck, because the way that scarecrow was moving, I swear it had a high-ranking belt in martial arts in a past life.
Now inside the basement searching for Sadie (she had been swallowed up by the floor), the group found Lars' name scratched into the wall, glowing fiercely as the wall opened up to reveal a giant mouth.
Believing that the poltergeist was asking for Lars as a sacrifice, Reinaldo threw him into the mouth in an attempt to get Sadie back. Steven jumped in to save Lars, using his powers to summon the protective bubble. In turn, the mouth attempted to swallow them both only to destroy the shield along with itself.
Sadie and Lars were safe and sound, and the gem is found by Steven. Just before Steven sends it away, the gem reveals that Lars and Reinaldo used to be friends at one point, but Lars ended the relationship to avoid being embarrassed in front of other people.
This is the most important part of the episode, as before this scene, they had not revealed that Lars and Reinaldo had known each other beyond what one might expect from those living in a small town.
There are three points to consider here:
1/Lars was embarrassed to be friends with Reinaldo even back then.
2/When the group arrived at Reinaldo's house, Lars took the chance to scare Reinaldo often, either with simple tactics such as the classic 'Boo!' or threat of physical harm (at which Reinaldo cowered despite being larger and stronger). This leads me to believe that there is some bullying subtext between the two, with Lars being the bully.
3/That bullying subtext makes me more curious as to what happened between them after Lars stopped being his friend, especially since Reinaldo did not hesitate to sacrifice Lars to the poltergeist. This part is especially important, since it says that not only is there a problem with Reinaldo's willingness to sacrifice someone to the poltergeist, but that the relationship between Reinaldo and Lars is bad enough for Reinaldo to sacrifice him to the poltergeist.
Managed to get caught up on the most recent Steven Universe episodes. I really enjoyed them, and I have thoughts about the one from last week, Beach City Horror Club. Very interesting episode, and I'll likely be writing my thoughts on it soon enough.
Alone Together - Tonight's Episode of Steven Universe
Saw the latest episode of Steven Universe a short while ago. I loved it, though since I'm about to talk about it, you can imagine there will be spoilers under the cut.
There are so many things to love about this episode. So much that not only has it become my favorite episode for the moment, but I honestly believe it is the best episode shown thus far.
Not only did Steven finally learn to fuse, but he fused with Connie. I love their adorable little relationship, and I love how they try to help each grow and slowly expand their comfort zones.
Garnet's approval of this was a definite plus, especially when she told them to go enjoy themselves. What I found really special about this is that Garnet has always behaved like a mother to Steven, telling him to be careful and warning him not to get in over his head. Telling Steven and Connie to enjoy themselves was a wonderful moment, mostly because their fusion was seen as somewhat of a... mistake, so to speak. (Pearl was definitely worried about the whole situation, and did urge them to split apart).
All of the animation for this episode was amazing. I loved every bit of it. Got to congratulate the artists and animators for all they did.
Back to the relationship between Steven and Connie. Their fusion was an interesting way to see it grow and develop. Both of them seemed to be pretty happy when they were fused together, and the fact that they did so and managed to remain so for so long shows that they have a truly deep and meaningful connection with each other.
Then came the part with the donuts, and the part where they danced at the raid. They weren't happy. They weren't very comfortable. The whole situation made them realize that although they were fused together, things were much different. They realized they work better together when they're by each others' side than when they are fused.
Relationships (of any kind) don't really work as well when you behave as a hive-mind. It's great when two people connect so well and have similar interests, but they work better when they are supporting each other and trying to grow, both as individuals and as people in a relationship.
This episode didn't really reveal much in terms of the plot (aside from showing us that Steven can fuse with other human beings), but it showed us so much about Steven and Connie, and the way they both work.
As always, Steven Universe continues to be one of my favorite animated series of all time. I can't wait to see how far this series goes, especially since they've been asked to work on a second season.
It's been quite a journey. Unfortunately, I've neglected this blog for quite some time in terms of regular updates and original content. Fortunately, however, I've finished writing the manuscript for Soujou: The Warring States. Standing at 130k+ words and 348 pages (wish it could have had that last two to make it even :/ ), it is currently put away for the next few weeks before I start the rewriting process.
In the meantime, I've already gotten started on researching everything I need for the the submission and publishing process. Aside from regular commitments like school and work, I'll also be looking to see if I can be active on this blog. What I'll be doing with it, I'm not sure, but I still want it to be dedicated to the book. Make it an author platform, maybe?
I have a notebook full of some very minor ideas for stories, just basic plot ideas and such that I've collected over the time it took me write this manuscript. For the most part, I wrote very little about them because I have difficulty completing a task if I'm multi-tasking, so working on more than one project at once might be too much for me.
Yet, as I've re-read the ideas I had listed down, I noticed that so very few of them are appealing to me. Though I'm sure great things could be done with these plot bunnies, as all stories grow and change during the writing period, there aren't many I'm particularly interested in committing to as a project.
For the sake of keeping you all updated, I'll list the few ideas I've got in my notebook that I'm somewhat interested in working on next.
1/Soujou: Part 2 - With no definite title at the moment, this is the sequel to the current manuscript I've written. Working on it next would definitely result in the series having some regular releases should it ever get published, but I'm more inclined to finish rewriting the current manuscript before working on the follow up.
2/The Safest Place - Set in a post-apocalyptic Earth after devastating climate changes due to global warming, a young man and his dog tries to guide his family to a safe haven rumored to be located in Canada.
3/Cofresi - A historical fiction story about a lesser-known pirate of the Caribbean named Cofresi. Whether it will be a set of his adventures or a narrative arc, I'm planning on making it a stand-alone.
Not a bad start, though these are literally 1/5 of the total amount of ideas I had in my notebook. In any case, I'll be looking to do something, and these are just a few possible projects I'll be working on next.
Well, it's been a good start to 2015, let us see how far we get.
Starke! You seem to know quite a bit about guns. Can you talk a bit about sawed-off shotguns for me? I've been trying to research them forever, but they're illegal to sell where I live so I don't get a lot of good information, just a lot of YouTube vids on how to make them. I'm mostly wondering what a standard size/weight is, what the damage is in comparison to a full-sized shotgun, and how easy it would be to carry/conceal it. Any information would be hugely appreciated!!!
Almost by definition, there isn’t a standard size or weight. A sawed off shotgun is just an illegally modified weapon, that’s been cut down to make it easier to conceal.
In general, civilian pump action shotguns tend to be roughly 6.5 to 7 lbs. Barrel length varies depending on what the shotgun is intended for. Hunting shotguns frequently have ~28” barrels, combat versions frequently have ~18” ones or shorter.
The weapon itself can easily add another 20” inches to the overall length, so you’ll end up with a 38” firearm. (I’m using the Remington 870 as an example if anyone’s curious.) At slightly over three feet, you could reasonably stuff it under a full trench and go on with your day.
With a shotgun, the barrel’s length doesn’t affect it’s damage, but it does affect the spread. Longer barrels will have a narrower spread, and be effective at greater ranges.
Cutting the barrel down results in a wider spread and a shorter range weapon, in addition to making it easier to conceal.
With a pump-action (or tube fed semi-auto) shotgun, you can’t gut the barrel shorter than the magazine (the second tube running under the barrel). So, that’s a hard limit, and it will vary even with specific shotgun models.
The Remington 870 I mentioned above has varying magazine capacities ranging from 4 to 7 shells. Doing some quick math; a 12 gauge shotgun shell is between 2.5 and 2.75 inches, so, your 7 shell magazine could be nearly 20 inches long, meaning you couldn’t cut enough off a 20 inch barrel for it to matter.
The second thing that can be cut is the stock. This will reduce your ability to properly stabilize the shotgun, but, again, it will make it easier to conceal. Ignoring bullpups, I’m not aware of any shotguns that actually run vital components into the stock, but that is an issue with some rifles (including the entire M16/M4 family), so if you’re starting with some exotic full auto shotgun, getting rid of the stock might cause problems.
With a breach loading shotgun, you can cut it down to an almost pistol sized weapon. Anecdotally, these will have a very wide spread, though I couldn’t tell you what their effective range is or what they weigh. You might be able to stash one of these in a custom shoulder holster, and it might be short enough to hide under a jacket.
Small military/law enforcement shotguns for use in close quarters exist, and these can end up with 10” barrels. Combined with the pistol grip, you can end up with a shotgun that’s under 20” long. This won’t quite fit under a jacket, but a thigh length coat should be able to conceal it.
I don’t know the weight for those, but at a guess, I’d stick it at around 5 to 6lbs.
The primary use for sawed off shotguns is going to be indoors in cramped spaces, where a full length weapon would get in the way or be awkward to use. Homes and apartments are the primary examples. Existing compact shotguns are used primarily as breaching weapons, to destroy a door’s latch and hinges with a frangible round before entry.
It might also be worth it to look at this post from July. That was about a near future urban combat environment, but some of the details might be applicable, so long as you remember the specific weapon names I was picking were more for giving them high tech looking weapons rather than actual combat workhorses. (I’m specifically linking to my response to ProRonin because I forgot to talk about carbines in the original post, not for the powered armor.)
I'm writing a story in which I only really describe the three biggest characters. The main protagonist and her owner (the protagonist's a slave), are both white, and the other character is black. The rest of the cast I have left deliberately ambiguous as to their race, but I was wondering if maybe I shouldn't do this. I kind of wanted the reader to figure it out for themselves, but would it be better to specify that some of the other characters are POC?
Racially Ambiguous Characters
We as humans have a learned idea of what the default human is in our mind’s eye, just like we have a learned idea of what is fashionable. It is influenced by our surroundings. Because the media and so on has the “default human” as White, the tendency of audiences is to assume a White character unless specifically told otherwise. For you to learn more about this, Colette has a blog post called Defying White As Default, which has interesting links for further reading, and links for how to tactfully and effectively indicate race a number of ways.
-Elaney
The Dangers of Racially-Ambiguous Characters and the racial ambiguity tag for your perusal.
To create a country, nation, kingdom, empire, state, emirate, whatever, you need some borders. However, sometimes borders can be vague.
Making Borders: There are a lot of things you can use for borders, such as: rivers, lakes, mountains, canyons, roads, landmarks, coastlines, major change in geography (grass/desert, for example), a giant tree, some old ruins, an abandoned village, really just whatever. More modern and industrialized societies will have stricter borders that won’t be subject to easy change.
Reason for Borders: You should come up with reasons for why a border is where it’s at, especially if it’s relevant to your story. A border might have been extended after winning a war or two groups might have come to an agreement that one group cannot claim an area past a certain river. Some reasons can be related to mythology. For example, a group of people might set a river or a hill as a border if they have superstitions about what is on the other side.
Water: It’s tricky to make borders on lakes and other bodies of water if you don’t have the proper technology. Whether you need to figure this out depends on your story. If your characters don’t have certain technology that allows for precise locating, such as GPS or magic, they might use the stars at certain times of the year to locate borders.
Your Needs: Figure out what you need in your fictional country before you create the shape, size, and borders. If your characters need to be near an ocean or a major trading port, you’ll need an ocean, a large lake, or a sea as a border.
Vague Borders: Sometimes groups of people have vague borders. They may not know where the exact border is, but they know what is and is not their land. For example, they may say that the border of their area is wherever all of their settlements end, but these settlements can change and grow over time thus easily changing the border.
The Creators: Who created the borders? Someone within that country? Settlers? Were the borders created by the creation of neighboring countries? The citizens themselves?
I've been working steadily on the story, and have reached chapter twelve out of a revised fifteen chapters. Originally, I thought I would be at the end of it by now, but it seems I underestimated the amount of information I would cover in the remaining chapters. So far, I've surpassed 93k words and still have three more chapters to write, as well as finish this one.
Though I am surprised at how much I've managed to get done, I am still amazed at how long it seems this story will be. I didn't think it would get far past 100k, but its seems like I was wrong. Likely, the end of this will be somewhere around 110k words, though I'm not worried too much about that.
See, there's still final edits to be made, and I know there are scenes I might cut out due to them setting up small subplots that I've either abandoned, or might simply not cover much in this book. Though I might add a few things as well, I'm pretty sure that the end result will be somewhere around 100k or so.
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Currently working on chapter 11 of Soujou, and though it's only about halfway done, I realized that this song may be the perfect fit for this part of the story. It certainly sets the mood and feelings of the characters as they go through this part of their journey.
So, I had outlined the last few chapters of the story. I predicted there to be about 13 total, but it seems that it'll be one chapter longer.
I've written up half of the content that I intended to have in Chapter 9, but I've gotten quite close to the average length of my chapters. If I add in the other half to this chapter, I'll unfortunately go past that limit and have an extremely long chapter that does not need to be that long.
As such, I'm ending chapter 9 where I'm at and will continue the rest of the material in the outline in a new chapter, since I'm sure the remaining material will be close to the length of a chapter as well.
In any case, there's nothing wrong with a little variation in chapter length.
Well, my charger got fried about a month ago, so I haven't been using my own computer. Instead, I'm using a rather old one that my sis had lying in her room. It's not bad. The computer still works, though kind of slow at times, and can be a little frustrating when it freezes up.
As a result, I haven't been able to fill up the queue again, so it'll be a while before you start to see those again. The reason being that I was using xkit to fill up the queue and tag posts, and this computer doesn't allow me to effectively use it.
The most positive outcome out of this situation is that I had uploaded the latest copy of Soujou: The Warring States to Google Drive, and I've continued writing it on this old computer. The connectivity problems can be rather annoying at times, for it prevents me from writing until it is resolved, but I've managed.
Story itself is going well, to be honest. Currently halfway through chapter 9, and I have outlined 12-13 chapters total, so this story is close to being over. Once it is finished, though, I still have to go over it and a) rearrange a few scenes and b) rewrite or remove a few scenes. Fortunately, those scenes aren't major additions, and the word count will remain at roughly 100k total when I'm done with it all.
Regardless, this is the draft I will be polishing up and sending to publishers soon enough, so I'm happy with what I've done so far, and how far I've gotten.
I'll definitely need to workshop it, though, to make sure that I've covered what I need to cover and haven't left any plot holes or forgotten to add enough description (which I'm notorious for, since I've grown to dislike excessive description and struggle to write descriptions that have enough for the reader to better immerse their self into the story. A room is a room, you guys, not much special about it). But I digress.
My favorite thing is this idea that they somehow are able to silently stalk people despite being almost 100-foot tall skeletons, because no one looks up.
Gashadokuro aka the starving skeletons are the reanimated and combined bones of the victims of starvation. Up to a hundred feet tall, they are heralded by the sound of bells ringing in the ears of their victims. They reach down from above to capture people and bit their heads off. The Gashadokuro haunt the darkness after midnight.
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