FYS: Since I have been gently reminded that I need to get serious about my sh*t.

[jeriendhal]

Rough outline for a potential FYS story collection

Prolog

1. Realization

2. Mimsey's Tale

3. NEW Best Day Ever (aka The Quisling's Tale)

4. NEW The Last Battle of Motorized Rifle Troop 239 (WIP)

5. For Your Safety (original story)


1500 Years Later

1. NEW Wake Up Call (continuation of original FYS story)

2. Quisling and Khan (some new bits. Probably less of the BDSM Sexytymes)

?. Snapped, The Mountaineer, The Writer,  continuation of Mimsey's Tale (NEW maybe), The Great Transcircumfiral Road Race (NEW maybe).


Notes: Really got come up with a name for the original FYS protagonist. I could get away with avoiding it in the original story, but if I want to do more with him I'm gonna have to come up with something.

A FYS novel is going to need a plot that will allow some travelogue style storytelling to allow readers to get the scale and layout of the Ring. Somehow making a reader dive through the standard Groupmind "Welcome to the Ring!" FAQ seems like cheating.

Also stuff like Break Off, Sci-FI Cinderella and The Visitors is probably going to have to be stuffed into the NOT CANON bin, unless I start a seperate AU anthology.

Comments

[seawasp]

I dunno. The Visitors (that's the alien ship one, yes?) is one of the strongest pieces of the series, because of how it forces the Groupmind(s) to confront its own issues in ways that the humans have not heretofore managed.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

Nnnnnnnn... I'm on the fence about that one. I'll agree that the story is strong, but it's such a game changer that it deserves its own novel, or atleast more build up to establish the Ring and the default Groupmind/Human society.

Also sticking aliens in seems like cheating and not giving Humans a real chance to confront the GM on their own.

[seawasp]

Well... yes and no. A second book, yes.

As to whether it's cheating... maybe sorta? Part of the problem is that the Groupmind's had thousands of years to get its decisions "set", and your depiction seems to make both Morphs and the Groupmind as a whole *PEOPLE*, which means they do tend to have trouble changing decisions that they've committed to without something jarring them loose. One has to presume that any of the easy paths to adjusting the Groupmind's approach were already attempted, without success.

There certainly is a lot to be said for following the path wherein the Morphs themselves become the intermediaries and supporters of a readjustment of human-Groupmind relations, of an evaluation of where to change the balance point of human freedom and Groupmind control, and doing this through the connection of humans and Morphs and emotional expansion on both parts. I can see that you might want to continue down that path.

On the other hand, many of your stories establish the Groupmind's nigh-omniscience and power, and it seems extremely hard to imagine that it wouldn't notice any significant organized actions against its own judgment. Yes, the Morphs and any other components must be given certain capabilities, but the Groupmind is just so incredibly HUGE that you really are fighting a lot of your own buildup in order to convince a reader that any serious opposition -- even merely "seriously considered in conversation" opposition -- could happen without some kind of real game-changer.

The thing that makes the aliens work to me is that they serve a TRIPLE purpose. First, the Not-Groupmind in the Other is a terrible and shocking "wakeup call" to the Groupmind (and especially to Groupmind 2, the little one). It's a zombie-like mirror held up in front of them forcing them to wonder if, perhaps, they have made mistakes more subtle but no less terrible. Second, it serves as a catalyst for human beings to GET enough power and independence to actually be able to argue, even for a short time, with the Groupmind on *anything* like an equal footing. And third, the presence of the Aliens creates a NEW problem for everyone involved and thus diverse new possibilities for stories.