philosophy, psychology and other long words beginning with p. discussion

I just finished and am naturally worried for Lavender and Marigold's sake. But as there are many more pages to follow, I think they will ultimately be fine.

Okay, I'll work on the behind the scenes soon. I'll get Lichen first, but Sam's chapter is short, so hopefully I'll get them both pretty quickly.

Sorry, it's been busy lately. Haven't forgotten. Hopefully soon. Same goes for Chapter 8.

:) The beauty of an online group such as ours is that there is no exact timeline and it is so flexible. We can come and go at our convenience! You have been so wonderful to give us insights not to mention letting us read your book for free!

Thanks! I like your view of timelines and flexibility. Are you hiring? Because I would totally work for you.

Well, I would try to be flexible if I had my own company. :)

Okay, sorry again, but it's looking like another week at least for these behind the scenes. I won't forget. Got to go away for a few days then will have family in town.

I hope you have a nice trip to be followed by a good visit with family.

Thanks!

Okay, finally back! Let's jump right in with the behind-the-scenes of the Orphan's chapter. Unfortunately it took me so long to get this out that you may have forgotten much of the chapter. Here we go...

One of my past projects was a newspaper-style comic strip called 'The Kitchen Sink.' It never got picked up (about 2,000 people submit to syndicates annually and only maybe 3 get picked up) so you wouldn't recognize it. I never put it online either. But it was a project my brother and I worked on, and three of the main characters were Sam, Guy, and Al. Those characters were darkened a little bit, Sam made more innocent and less sarcastic, and their names used for this chapter.

Because this chapter is narrated by a child, I tried to simplify the language a bit. That was a challenge, because I wanted to keep the writing style consistent with the rest of the book. I didn't realize until later just how many characters in Ancient Canada were orphans. There will be a second orphanage in a later chapter (The Bog Man). I didn't plan it that way, just happened. Maybe it had to do with a lot of the justice issues I wanted to cover.

The Manbare is mentioned several times throughout the story, mostly here. It's a legendary creature that Guy and Al want to hunt, and convince Sam to go along as bait. It's not supposed to be spelled Man-bear. It's supposed to be spelled Manbare, and is, but just picture a bare polar bear (with no fur) and you have a Manbare. It's like a werewolf or a unicorn would be in our world- a legendary creature nobody believes in once they get a little older.

The herisson is like a small hedgehog. This was the animal whose quills could be played as a musical instrument, then sprays permanent ink over Guy and Al's faces. Herisson is French for hedgehog. When I was trying to figure out what to name this thing, I looked up synonyms and origins of the words hedgehog and porcupine. Turns out hedgehog has its roots in the same word as urchin, and the boys in this chapter could certainly be called urchins if we were in the right time and place. To avoid confusion, I didn't name it an urchin; I named it a herisson. One thing I learned while writing my first book, there can be a surprising amount of detail behind such a small decision.

When Sam tells Lavender about hunting the Manbare, he says, "and I was going to keep the tail." I was very much thinking of Lenny from Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, when he says, "And I get to tend the rabbits." Just an innocent character surrounded by a non-innocent situation.

The song/poem "My Brother's Dinner" was meant to set up the cycle of poverty, and a poor man's sacrifices. Often the poor are the first asked to lay down their life, or the situation is such that they benefit by entering the line of fire when it wouldn't be worth it to do so, had they come from a more affluent background. I needed a song for Marigold to sing to the boys (and to show what the herisson could do). Fortunately I didn't have to come up with the music. Frankly, I think it would be hard to set this song/poem to music because it doesn't change its rhythm at all. Of course there's always the daydreaming an author does about 'What if they make this into a movie?' That'll never happen, and that's fine. But hypothetically... for me that would mean 75% chopped from the story, or a 10 hour movie. (Maybe a good mini-series? Each episode focuses on a different narrator?) But I did think about what song, already written, might lend its melody to My Brother's Dinner if that were to happen. I came up with Goodbye Girl by The Squeeze. Any other suggestions?

That's about all I have for this one. It was a short chapter. We're still early on in the book, and I wanted to avoid long chapters early. I thought it might make readers quit reading if I put long chapters early in the story. I saved the longer chapters for later, once the reader is more invested and immersed. But we will see a little more of these characters in an overlap scene (the soldiers ambushing their campsite). That'll be in the Commandant's chapter, and like My Brother's Dinner, it's meant to reflect the cycle of poverty. We've switched off the gender issues for the moment, which were common in the chapters preceding this.

It's neat to have a connection to your comic strip in the story. I've wondered about making this into a movie. They probably wouldn't do the backtracking with different points of views as much, but the action would probably be there. I've heard that Alice in Wonderland was just written to entertain the children that Lewis Carroll knew. This book is very deliberate in message and yet entertains.

Thank you! That was the whole goal, for sure. To hopefully have a message worth saying but to present it in a palatable format. I've seen a few documentaries where I thought the message was great, but they did a disservice to the message by making the delivery so dry and painful. In fact sometimes it makes you wonder who paid for the documentary... the people who believe in the message, or its opponents.

Often I've thought, "If I went through the book and got rid of all the philosophy and esoteric stuff, I might have a shot at making some money." But still those odds are slim, and when you do that, you're competing against all the mainstream authors out there. Good luck. Plus, you gotta feel comfortable with what you put out there.

I'd of course be thrilled if this were to become a movie. Then they could do whatever they wanted with it. They could make it mainstream and rip out all the philosophy; that's fine. Because if they were to do that, the beginning of the movie would say, "Based on..."

These are all fantasies of course, like winning the lottery, but from the behind-the-scenes perspective of writing my first book, yeah, I'm guilty, it's definitely something I've fantasized about. I'd love for it to become a movie, make me ten million dollars, then I could give every dime to Franciscan charities. Maybe not a common fantasy, but a rewarding one. I don't want that kind of money. Just another rope tying me to a cart (Agrippin's chapter will get into all that free will stuff. Cleanthes, a Greek philosopher said, "A wicked man has no more free will than a dog tied to a cart." I get into that towards the end of the book.).

As for Lewis Carroll, if all his story did was entertain the children he knew, he probably would have been pretty happy with himself. That's why it means a lot when a friend, family member, or you guys say, "Yeah, I liked that chapter." I can't wait to hear what my kids think, but they're toddlers right now, so I should probably save the free will stuff for a little later.

That would be so great to be able to donate to charity. Yes, people often read the book something is based on so they could hook them with the plot and then seek the book and learn the philosophy.

The assisted living home where my Grandpa lived the last two years of his life was associated with the Franciscan nuns. I was a nice place and they respected that my Grandfather was not an outwardly religious man.

Where was it? Was it in Pennsylvania? I knew someone from North Carolina who regularly went up to PA to volunteer in something that sounds a bit like that.

Sorry I was so tardy in answering. No, it's in Omaha, NE and called New Cassel. I used to live in PA though.