Answering questions

Let me use this post to answer some of your questions.

Firstly, my “book-writing” software. I initially created the program as a sort of brain dump management (in case anyone wonders, dump is actually an official term used in software world, most commonly referring to memory dumps), a customized spreadsheet that suited me and my somewhat hectic brain structure. Through regular bursts of enthusiasm and weekends spent in front of the computer screen, the program acquired features suitable for story writing. It allows me to input main characters, their physical and psychological descriptions, their relationships, major positive and negative traits. When the main characters are established I can move onto setting out main plot milestones, detailing the characters, the places, the motivations. Once all the data’s in place, the program produces a plot outline, providing an approximate chapter by chapter breakdown, timing for major revelations and for red herrings (who enjoys a book without them). It also produces some nice wall charts that are very useful for keeping a visual image of the story.

Now, this is starting to sound pretty good even to me. Of course, it’s not that wonderful. The program has a few bugs, few problems here and there... and its main flaw – it doesn’t actually write books. It’s a tool. A tool that works fine for me, but would probably cause an outcry of negative feedback if it was ever marketed. It’s handy, it keeps my thoughts organised, it helps me to re-focus my brain from job-oriented to book-oriented and ... that’s all really.

The Gardener

I haven’t quite finished the Snowflake as I write this, but it’s oh so close. I’m planning to type the final stop to the final sentence sometime next week. Still, the story is there. My characters have finished telling the tale and I’m simply documenting it now.

The Gardener, on the other hand, is untold. It’s floating around me like early-morning mist, revealing very little, yet promising so much. Writing a book, as I found out, is as much of a journey for the writer as it is for the readers. And I can’t wait to step onto the new trail and see where it leads me. As always, I welcome everyone along.

Writing full time. Second novel, Gardener, is conceived.

I’m back and I have great news. Spending time at home with my family provided an enormous boost to my writing. That is, in addition to a huge bubble of happiness that’s still floating somewhere in my chest. I have to constantly check that my feet are still touching the ground!

Being away from the day job meant I could write full time and, for the first time since I started, I actually felt like a writer. I had a massive influx of ideas from the day one. Not being able to fit them all in into the Snowflake, I started recording them into my software program. It didn’t take long for it to inform me that I had enough plot milestones to start another book.
I’ve chosen ‘Gardener’ as the title for my second novel. Just as the Snowflake, the Gardener will have a single human flaw entwined into the back-story. And just as the Snowflake, there will be a legend to give a deeper meaning to this modern tale of computer crime. The flaw I’ve chosen for the second book is fear. Fear that either makes you stronger, or slowly erodes your soul until there’s nothing left.

Snowflake, The Legend

I have already mentioned the reason I decided to use Snowflake as the title for my novel.

In the novel Sally Clarke tells her daughter, Amanda, a legend about a Snowflake. She explains to the child that kindness fights cruelty, friendship is better than enmity, truth is worth much more than lies and only indifference has no antidote. Snowflakes have been sent as a reminder to people to care for each other, to clear their mind and soul of negativity, to notice the beauty of the world around them. Tiny snowflakes, each an epitome of care taken in crafting it differently from millions of others. They are like a human souls carved in ice: so similar, yet each unique.

I’m going away on a three week long holiday in a few days time. I’ll be visiting my parents, my grandparents and my German shepherd. I’m also planning to do some serious writing in a hope that the walls and the gardens of my childhood home will nourish my imagination. In the meanwhile, I’d like to leave the Legend of the Snowflake for you to read.

Indifference

It’s easy to understand why people do good things; it’s the bad that puzzle. In children’s fairytales villains are simple, two-dimensional characters with little depth and the only fitting description of evil. As grownups we understand that good and bad have shades of grey in between. How is it that a real-life villain is made? Can simple feelings, even positive traits, turn into flaws nasty enough to make us into a villain? Can admiration turn to envy, fear into cruelty, contentment into indifference?

Indifference is the feeling I want to talk about today. Is indifference a vice? Is indifference to human suffering as bad as causing that suffering? Is indifference good or bad, or neutral? I see indifference as a null-feeling, a no-feeling. To me it’s not an opposite of care, but a no care, a complete absence of compassion. We get so engrossed into our own lives, our own problems that we forget to think about other people. When I talk about indifference I hear people responding: “What’s the point, there’s nothing I can do about it.” You don’t need to be able to do anything to care. And if enough of us care, maybe then we’ll finally be able to do something.

Global Economic Crisis

I don’t think that the topic of Economic Crisis needs an introduction. The one that happened, or rather got accepted and announced, just over six months ago affected nearly every one of us. People like me who were trying to get a foothold on the property ladder, found getting mortgages impossible; people already owning a home suffered from bad rates (unless you had a tracker), negative equity, even repossession. Coincidentally, organisations started major re-structuring and improvement of the overall org charts A.K.A. sacking. And job losses became another big hit of this crisis that turned global.

It didn’t take long for the why-it-all-happened programs to appear on TV, so at least now we have an official version of what went wrong. I don’t know exactly why the financial bubble burst, but I believe that there were plenty cyber criminals who used the situation to their advantage, worsening the effects of crisis further. I’m trying to describe one such possible scenario in the Snowflake. However, before I do, I want to ask for your opinion. Would you agree that serious computer crime doesn’t get enough coverage and that the real extent of cyber machinations is much greater than we are lead to believe?