More maunderings on writing copycat books

[jhetley]

I'm wondering if just skewing the setting might represent a big-enough difference. Maybe a US that's just something a little off, with Stanley Steamers and Baker Electrics winning the auto wars and Edison inventing the telephone (he came close) while Tesla founded GE and Westinghouse dominated the streetcar business. Or something that's totally fictional but with technology we can recognize, like Wells did with her Ile-Rien series....

Thus do we spin our writerly wheels.

Comments

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

That might be a cool setting, but what is the _story_? What might happen in your book that can *only* happen under those circumstances, can *only* happen to people who live there? Look at the Lord Darcy novels and how - and why - they work - what do the people in your world have that we don't?

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

I won't know the answer to that until I make the changes (IF I make the changes) and start writing again. Some writers have their stories leap from their foreheads fully armed. I muddle my way into them and find surprises along the way.

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

It's more interesting that way...

I find - and it's one of the reason I read SF - that setting begets plot and characters. Sometimes characters beget setting - they walk in, they do stuff, and it's up to me to figure out why and how it would work.

Fun, though...