<< #0
A Day in the Clouds has officially started and I, for one, cannot wait to see what difference its earnings make to the lives of its recipients. If you haven't read the first chapter, now's your chance to do so. Go on, I'll wait.
Done? Great! On to brass tax. Did you ... Did you like it? Hate it? Feel free to leave a comment there regarding your thoughts. Whether it's positive or negative, it's alright. I won't take offense. If anything, non-comments are more offensive. While you're at it, if you want an extra 5 STEEM (WOW Much Money Such Big Spender!) in your wallet, just vote on the chapter and re-steem it, then mention it in your comment alongside your thoughts. I know it's not much now, but hopefully it'll increase in time. Since I'm not taking any money from the project, I'd have to get it from my own pocket. The price of publicity.
As you may have noticed, the title consists of a time range, specifically 0500 and 0600. Spoiler alert: That's a trend that's going to persist throughout the series. Get it? A Day in the Clouds. The whole book is going to consist of 24 chapters, each spanning the length of an hour.
Oh, like that series '24'? The one with Kiefer Sutherland. You f*cking copycat.
Yes, like that series, and no, Kiefer, this wasn't an intentional copy of the concept. First of all, I did not watch that show, and secondly, I had thought about writing something like this since I first imagined ever becoming a writer. Does that really qualify as copying something? It's not for me to say but, no, it does not.
Anyway, so yeah, on to a (hopefully) brief discussion about the chapter. I decided to start it off as a dream because that's what big ambitious projects usually begin with, right? I don't want to give too much away, but I tried my best to not use chapter-wide dream sequences too much, even though children 3-5 years usually sleep from 8 to 14 hours (!!).
As I mentioned in the introduction/preface, the events that will transpire in this book are based on real events, which I observed roughly over 2 years ago during my stay in my father's province. Some events happened during different days, but I tried to fit them all together in the context of one day.
It was a very interesting exercise to constrain a story into one day, as there are a lot of factors to consider like the energy level at a given time, what events happen during that time, and, since my nephew has not demonstrated the ability to express his emotions accurately, different interpretations of the actions he is conveying. I had to take note of nap times, movement patterns, placement of objects, and the like. It was such a fun process, and it took me quite a while to fully realize what I had. That was the Data Scientist in me having fun collecting data, while the writer part of me is busy thinking of different spins on mundane actions.
The protagonist's name is Ledd, because my nephew's name is Zeppelin. Get it? Led Zeppelin. I added the extra 'd' because my name is Jed, and Ledd is kind of an amalgamation of my childhood with his. Mostly his though. I don't want to fall into my habit of over-explaining things so I'll leave the other stuff up for debate.
Also, I'm not quite sure if I've mentioned this before, but I just wanted to emphasize it: this is the first time I've ever written a story in the first-person. So, you know, please be kind? Whenever I write, I try to act out the scenes, playing as different characters in my head. It gets really tense when I write psychologically-disturbed characters, so I try to avoid them. Kind of like "method acting," but for writing. Method writing. I've never really been fond of first-person stories because of the strict narrative perspective, but I've mellowed out in recent years.
Way to keep it brief, huh? I love experimenting when I write, so let me know if this was too short or this needs a little more meat in it. Even though A Day in the Clouds has basically been finished during NaNoWriMo, Silver Lining is being written weekly, without any plan whatsoever. Let me know if you have any suggestions of what you might want to read here. The next posts in this series would have more meat. I promise.
Profile Progress
My cousin and her husband are really busy, what with raising three kids and managing a remote business. They haven't really found the time to create a Steemit account yet, but I'm periodically reminding them to do so. That's why I'm dedicating this small section of this series for that update. Meanwhile, you can just leave messages of motivation or well wishes in the comments section for A Day in the Clouds or Silver Lining. I'll make sure that it reaches them.
I'm keeping a tally of the earnings on a spreadsheet, and I've stopped my power down (which I started way back when it just paid out 2 STEEM per week) so that the earnings remain intact.
Thanks for reading! Follow me @jedau for stories, solutions and other stuff that begin with 'S'!
