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Autumn 2013 Semester: Wrap-Up Report

Posted: December 16, 2013 in Living and Life, Progress Report
Tags: blogging, college life, entertainment, living and life, novel, Ohio State University, progress report, publishing, Reborn City, Video Rage, writing, WWII/Holocaust

Another semester passes by, and with it the realization of two things: one is that I have enough credit to be considered a senior now that the semester is over. The other is that I now have a year and a half left of my time at Ohio State University. Boy, way to make my time here feel finite.

Every semester is different and not just because of a set of new classes. For example, this semester I moved into an apartment with a friend about two blocks from campus, meaning we both had to take on a whole lot of different responsibilities. I also started taking five classes in a single semester, more than I’ve ever had in a single semester. At times the homework load was almost unbearable. I hope that next semester will be a bit easier, though judging by the amount of reading I’ll be doing that doesn’t look like the case.

This semester was also significant because two major events happened to me: I published my first novel Reborn City and I got accepted into a study-abroad trip to Europe for three weeks in May. The latter so far has taken up more of my attention, because I’m going to be spending all of next semester preparing for it. And I mean all of next semester: four out of five of the classes I’m taking are in preparation for what I’m going to study in Europe (by the way, the trip is about studying World War II). Still, RC has taken up a bit of attention too. I’ve had to advertise everywhere I can. I’m actually looking into putting an ad into the student newspaper if it doesn’t cost too much.

And as for my classes this semester, I took Introduction to Sociology, Introduction to Biology, Writing for English Majors, Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature, and History of the Holocaust. The latter two were my favorite classes (despite the dark subject material in the Holocaust course) and they were also the classes I did the best in, getting As on most papers and tests. All told, my grades added to a total 3.263 GPA. I’m happy with my grades (they’re all passing grades) but I’m going to aim for higher next semester. Especially since going on the trip and keeping my scholarships will require me to keep my grades up!

Well, I hope to have more good news later. Watch out for my Spring Semester 2014 Pre-Semester Report. It’ll probably be showing up in the next couple of weeks. In the meantime, I’m going to make dinner and finish Ch. 28 of Video Rage. Wish me luck.

One Year Since Newtown

Posted: December 14, 2013 in Living and Life, Politics and Leadership, Reflections, Social Activism
Tags: activism, blogging, government, gun control, horror, living and life, politics and leadership, proper decisions, reflections, social media

I’m not sure there’s a single American in the country today who opened a newspaper, got on their smartphone, or connected to the Internet who doesn’t realize that today is exactly a year since the horrific tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Even now, the memories of that terrible day are resurfacing in my mind’s eye: sitting in bed, seeing that a school has been shot up by a gunman. Fatalities, fear, fingers already being pointed, conspiracy nuts shouting their insanity. But for a little while, the American people, a people so prone to heat and rage and division, were united in a way that hadn’t been seen since 9/11. We cried and memorialized the dead. There was grief for the 20 children and six adults who died, grief from people who’d never heard of Newtown until that day. There were numerous memorials and tributes, online and on TV and across the nation by everyone from children to the most powerful of politicians.

However in the days, weeks and months since Newtown, as we learned about the gunman Adam Lanza and we heard stories about the dearly departed. that unity broke up. We looked for solutions to prevent this tragedy from ever happening again. In a year full of monstrous mass shootings in Aurora, Wisconsin, and now in Newtown, advocates for stricter gun safety laws hoped that Congress would pass sensible gun control laws. And with ninety percent of Americans behind measures such as a ban on automatic rifles and expanded background checks, it looked like there might actually be some change this time. Second Amendment advocates meanwhile balked at these proposed measures, and instead said gun control laws didn’t work and called for administrators to be trained in firearm use and to hire security guards for schools. In the end, some states such as Colorado, New York, and Maryland passed their own restrictions, while President Obama passed 23 executive mandates and Congress failed to pass any laws that would truly satisfy either side.

Normally I would use a post such as this to advocate for stricter gun laws, but I’m tempted to not do so in order to keep the dead in mind on this horrible day. However, I read articles that show that the gun maker for the rifles used in the massacre actually had an increase in sales after Sandy Hook, and I feel a little sick to think anyone could profit off a tragedy such as this. Not to mention that nearly a year after Sandy Hook, there was a shooting at a school eight miles from Columbine High School, as if to remind us how little has been accomplished since then.

So I’ll speak and say, a year later, parents are gathering around dinner tables with a vacant seat. They wish to hold their kids close to them, but they can’t. And across the nations, parents and children, siblings and cousins, friends and families, lovers and colleagues, lose someone dear to them because of gun violence. In fact, approximately 30,000 people each year are lost to gun violence, the equivalent of nearly 1154 Sandy Hooks.

We need to do something about this tragedy, but is throwing more gasoline on a fire really going to help? No, it will not! We need to choke out the fire, not give it more fuel. So if you can, call or email your legislators. Support gun control groups if you can afford to. And if you own firearms of any sort, make sure it is in a safe place where it won’t hurt anyone who might accidentally stumble upon it. And I know any Second Amendment advocates will be furious with what I’ve written here, but let me tell you, I’m not advocating for taking away all guns from your homes. Even freedom of speech is regulated when that speech is used to incite violence or is used in a malicious manner. Shouldn’t guns be treated the same way?

And besides, do you really need a military grade automatic rifle? There are no zombies or enemy armies waiting to attack, you can’t go hunting with that kind of gun, and a simple handgun is enough to ward off any burglar or rapist. Just saying, is all.

I’m going to leave you with this video I found. It describes all the grief I feel for the victims of Sandy Hook, and I think it’ll resonate with you too on this most horrid day.

Being Time Conscientious In Fiction

Posted: December 9, 2013 in Living and Life, Reflections, Writing
Tags: authors, editing, entertainment, ideas, Laura Horn, novel, reflections, science fiction, writing

One thing I struggled with early on in my attempts to become a professional writer was time, or more accurately, keeping tack of it. In my earliest stories, whether it be about lycanthropic pirates or a Harry Potter-esque story of witches, keeping track of how much time has passed was not high on my to-do list. I was more concerned with making a novel that would sell millions of copies, win me legions of adoring fans, and regularly get adapted into blockbuster hits. Why should I pay attention to how quickly a year can pass or how it’s noon on one page and then sunset on the next when I have to decide who I want to play my female protagonist and if she’s going to be my girlfriend?

But I got older, and around the time I started writing my earliest vampire stories, I started to become more aware of the passage of time in those stories. I think it first occurred to me that it seemed weird that my characters were still in school around late June. From then on I tried to keep the passage of time consistent in the stories I wrote, and as I got much older and realized there were too many vampire novels out there at the moment for me to make a name for myself with those sorts of stories, I started to put dates and even the passage of hours in my outlines, which would later end up in the early drafts of the stories I wrote.

And no one else is more aware of time than the guys and gals who write the Doctor’s adventures.

If you examine other authors who are extemely popular, you’ll notice how they try to keep the reader as well as themselves aware of the passage of time without annoying the reader with it. For example, JK Rowling structured her entire Harry Potter series around the school year in Britain. Stephen King’s It switches between 1958 and 1985 and King makes sure to note how June passes on into July and July into August during the 1958 sections. And Jean Auel’s famous Children of Earth series is very particular of marking the passing of seasons and years.

All in all, I think keeping tack of the passage of time in my stories has very much improved them, and in some of these stories I need to be cognizant of how much time has passed in order to tell the story correctly. For example, my WIP Laura Horn takes place during the week leading up to the 2017 Presidential Inauguration. I went online to find advance calendar dates for that January, and only then did I write out the plot in my outline for the story. In addition, I have several ideas for stories that need to be very time conscientious while writing them. One takes place during World War II, meaning I’ll have to be very careful of the dates of certain events in order to tell the story correctly. And I have a science-fantasy story involving time travel that will require me to be very careful about the dates I use, should I ever get around to writing it.

The only thing I wish I was better at was keeping track of dates by making a timeline. However, doing a timeline at the outline stage isn’t always helpful because so much can change between the outline stage and in the actual writing of the story. Perhaps I can find some sort of middle ground in future stories. I might ask my writing group on Facebook if they have any tips on doing timelines.

And speaking of Facebook, I just want to remind people that I have a Facbook page and a Twitter feed, where I post on stuff that I don’t always post about on my blog. If you’re interested in checking either out, please do so.

How important is marking the passage of time in your stories? What do you do to keep track of time?

Why Again Did We Let Zimmerman Go?

Posted: November 26, 2013 in Living and Life, Politics and Leadership, Reflections, Social Activism
Tags: government, gun control, horror, living and life, politics and leadership, proper decisions, reflections

Remember George Zimmerman? The guy who shot Trayvon Martin? Guess what he’s done now: he’s threatened his girlfriend with a shotgun and threw her out of the house when she tried to dial 911. When the police searched his car, they found an AR-15, a shotgun, and three handguns. He’s been let free on a $9,000 bond, and he’s entered a plea of not guilty. And this isn’t his first brush with the law since he was let off this summer: he’s been pulled over three times for speeding and assaulted his wife (yeah, he’s still married). The only reason he wasn’t arrested with the last one was because of lack of evidence.

Now, back during the Trayvon Martin trial, those who supported Zimmerman were saying that he was defending himself, that Trayvon was high and unstable and dangerous. They ignored that he had a history of violence before the Martin incident, and they might just try to ignore this situation altogether. But I’m going to repeat what I said back then: that George Zimmerman attacked an unarmed teen and killed him, and got away with it because of lack of witnesses, including the victim who understandably couldn’t speak, and because of a law that makes no sense to me. Yeah, I don’t support Stand Your Ground laws. They basically say I can go into a public setting with a gun, start a fight with any random passerby, and shoot them if I feel threatened.

But the point is, Zimmerman’s proven that he’s more likely to instigate an incident than defend himself. This is his second assault since his acquittal. It’s only the first with enough evidence to actually go to trial. So I’m just going to be the first to say this: Zimmerman should’ve been convicted back in July, because he assaulted Trayvon and killed him. But he didn’t, and then he attacked his wife and girlfriend. Either of those assaults could’ve been avoided, just like Trayvon’s death could’ve easily been avoided, but we allowed them to happen.

I just hope that this time around, Zimmerman gets convicted, because honestly if he keeps getting off like this, his head’s only going to get bigger and he’ll think he’s invincible to prosecution and punishment. And I really don’t want to see the carnage a man like that can leave behind when he believes he’s unstoppable.

Let the trial begin!

I’m Writing Again!!!

Posted: November 21, 2013 in Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, Writing
Tags: authors, celebrities, college life, editing, entertainment, living and life, novel, Video Rage, writing

Good evening, Followers of Fear. How are you this evening? I don’t know about you, but I’m doing great! I just finished Chapter 20 of Video Rage, after working on it on-and-off for the past six or so days. This officially puts an end to my hiatus that kept me from doing any major writing, and puts me back on track to possibly finishing this novel by the end of this year or the end of January (one or the other, most likely).

It’s been over a month since I had to stop writing because of how busy I was with school and work. I just had way too much on my plate to devote any time to actually writing, but now that my schedule’s eased up a little, thanks to the semester ending soon and Thanksgiving coming even sooner, I can actually afford to sit down for hours at a time and just churn out stories. It’s a wonderful feeling.

Actually, the truth is not being able to write might’ve actually contributed to my stress levels getting worse rather than better. But being able to write these past couple of days has been just wonderful. I feel freer than I have since I began my hiatus, and now that I’ve gotten another chapter under my belt, I’m on a little bit of a writing high. In fact, the writing high made me write a longer chapter than I normally would’ve. Not that I mind though. I think the chapter the way it is right now is pretty awesome. It was a huge fight sequence, which I’m not normally good at writing. But I managed to extend it from what might’ve been a six-page chapter to a ten-page chapter, and it looks better than what I had originally planned, so it’s kind of a win-win situation.

I’ve also decided that working on two novels at once is not the best idea for me. One moment I’m yearning to work on one project but I have to work on the other, next moment I’m working on project number two but I want to work on the first project. It’s a little bit annoying. So for now I think I’ll stick to finished Video Rage, which has only seventeen chapters left in the first draft, and then I’ll get back to working on my other work-in-progress, Laura Horn. After that’s all done…well, who knows? Maybe some short stories, a new novel, some editing work. All depends on what’s on my schedule and what I feel like doing at the moment.

But to sum it all up, I’m really happy at the moment, and I look forward to finishing the first draft of Video Rage.

And while I have your attention, I also want to extend a hearty congratulations to fellow author, colleague, and good friend Angela Misri, whose Portia Adams novel Jewel of the Thames has just been accepted for publication by Fierce Ink Press. Mazel tov Angela, I’m so excited for you and I cannot wait to read all of Portia’s amazing adventures this coming spring. Keep me posted on the news, okay? Also, if your books get made into movies, who do you want to play Portia? Because from what I know of the character, I think Natalie Portman or Eve Myles would be a great early call.

All for now, everybody. Good night!

The 7 Beauties of Science Fiction

Posted: November 20, 2013 in ideas, Living and Life, Reflections, Writing
Tags: authors, college life, editing, entertainment, films, living and life, Ohio State University, reflections, science fiction, writing

In his book The Seven Beauties of Science Fiction, Istvan Csicery-Ronay Jr. explains some of the most common themes of science fiction. He did this in order to examine how these themes could apply and impact our lives as we navigate a world that relies increasingly on technology and information. However, they also make great guidelines for examining science fiction and for writing your own stories that take place somewhere far off in time and space.

We went over these seven beauties early in the semester in my SF/Fantasy literature course, but today we went over them again. It was an optional class today that focused more on fantasy than science-fiction, and we came up with our own seven beauties of fantasy because the two genres overlap and are entwined in so many way. After class, I came up with my own list the horror, but could only come up with five beauties. Oh well.

Anyway, I thought I’d do a trilogy of posts that focused on the different beauties for each genre, because they are related genres and because they overlap in so many ways, so it’s interesting to examine some of the mores and common themes of these three genres. First, I’d like to start with the seven beauties of science fiction, because that’s what I learned first and it’s from these that my class created the seven beauties of fantasy, and I created the five beauties of horror.

With each beauty, I give a definition and an example, some from books and movies I’ve read/watched, some from my own work, and some that I’ve just heard about. If you have any examples, please let me know. I may just add them into the list.

1. Neologisms–new words or phrases that are exclusive to the world of the story. Every term that refers to something that only exists in that world, that’s a neologism. Consider the term twanking from the short story Mr. Boy, or warp in Star Trek. Those terms are a part of the story, and outside the story don’t have any relevance (unless, for the latter term, you’re a theoretical physicist trying to figure out how to warp something from one end of the room to the other).

2. Novums–technology or inventions that exist only in the story of the world. Take the ansible from Ender’s Game, or the lightsaber, or the TARDIS. These are technologies years ahead of us, only existing in stories and as imitations we see sometimes at comic book conventions. One can consider the flying saucer a novum, because as far as we know, real flying saucers don’t exist.

3. Historical extrapolation–referring to events that happened in the past in order to explain the world as it is now. You know how in Episode IV of Star Wars Obi-Wan explains how the Empire rose and the Jedi Order was destroyed thanks to Darth Vader? That’s historical extrapolation. It’s referring to events not always seen in the actual story to explain how the world we are in came to be. Other examples include how the first invasion of the Buggers in Ender’s Game creates Ender’s world and the aliens coming to Japan during the Meiji era in GinTama.

4. Oxymoron–implausibility or absurdities that only work in the story. An example of this would be crossing a human with a housefly to get a man-fly or radiation causing the dead to rise, like in the original Night of the Living Dead. Another way to look at this would be the idea that the human species develops in other regions of the universe at the same time, and when all the species come together, they find out they are all similar. It’s not likely, is it? Yet we see it in science-fiction and we don’t question it.

5. Scientific Impertinence–when laws that are deemed “unbreakable” by science are broken. Travelling at light-speed without expanding your mass to incredible sizes or traveling through time and space all in the course of a second without any aftershocks or side-effects might count as this. Scientifically, they can’t happen, but they do in these stories.

6. Sublime chronotopes– the space/time of the story. A science-fiction story is our world with added elements of scientific nature. Therefore, Star Trek and everything in its franchise are technically taking place in this world, but in the future and on other planets or in the void of space. Therefore, defining the sublime chronotopes of a story is defining its time and space relative to yours.

7. Parable–what’s the story about? Most sci-fi stories, we will find, is a parable that explores a certain issue. District 9 is about apartheid and racism. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? explores what it means to be human. 2001: A Space Odyssey is about mankind’s dependence on technology. And A.I. Artificial Intelligence explores what could happen if robots and humans learned to bond with each other.

Whether you agree or disagree with these 7 Beauties of Science Fiction, they are useful in exploring the genre. And sometimes you can even use them as a tool in the endless debates that seem to come from popular franchises and stories.

Thanks for reading. I hope to have the 7 Beauties of Fantasy and the 5 Beauties of Horror up soon.

What do you think of the 7 Beauties listed here? Do you agree or disagree? Why? Do you have any examples?

An Update to My Article On Hypnosis

Posted: November 16, 2013 in Living and Life
Tags: celebrities, entertainment, hypnosis, living and life, television shows, writing

A little bit back I wrote an article about the truths and myths of hypnosis. In that article I mentioned that you can’t use hypnosis to kill someone, because you can’t force someone to do something they wouldn’t normally do, such as murder someone.

Turns out I was wrong. Apparently it is technically possible to make people commit crimes, including kill someone, through hypnosis.

I found this out through a special by Derren Brown, a British entertainer who regularly uses hypnosis in his acts. His shows are usually devoted to testing the limits of the abilities and techniques he uses in his acts, including hypnosis. This special, along with the rest in The Experiments series, aimed to look at the limitations of hypnosis and tried to see what you could or couldn’t really do with hypnosis. The special in question, which I embedded below, was devoted to seeing if it was possible to brainwash someone to become a killer, like it’s said often in the chat rooms of conspiracy theorists.

If you don’t have the time to sit down and watch a fifty-minute video, I’ll summarize the video below.

Okay, for those of you who didn’t watch it, the video detailed how basic hypnosis works, followed by searching for the perfect subject to be a hypnotized assassin, and then trained him to assassinate a certain celebrity (who agreed to be part of the production as the target), and then watched to see if the subject would assassinate the target, who had a bulletproof vest on. The subject did fire the gun.

So I was wrong. As much as I hate to admit it, hypnosis can be used to get someone to kill, even if they don’t realize what they are doing. However, it is extremely difficult to pull off, requiring months of training with the perfect subject and with the right hypnosis techniques. And even if you can pull this off, I wouldn’t recommend doing this sort of thing if you have any morals at all. Murder is murder, no matter what.

Now if you’ll need me, I’ll be writing and possibly thinking up some way to incorporate this terrible information into my views of hypnosis. With any luck I’ll be able to put this into a story I’ll write someday, which will most likely mean that I’ve accepted this new fact, and I’m not going to try to shut it out.

Until next time, Followers of Fear.

The End of My Writing Hiatus Is Nigh

Posted: November 15, 2013 in Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, Writing
Tags: college life, entertainment, Laura Horn, living and life, novel, Ohio State University, progress report, self-pub authors, Video Rage, weekly exercises, writing

Today there’s more good news to celebrate. Since October 22 I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus from writing because of how busy I was with school and work. However, things have eased up a bit since then. For the first time in a while, my homework load this weekend is a bit lighter than it’s been, and I don’t have that many books-for-pleasure piled up waiting for me to read them like I did when my hiatus started.

So guess what? That means pretty soon I’ll be able to actually sit down and do some writing! And thank God, because I’ve been itching to do some fiction writing, rather than the writing of numerous essays and papers tht have been my the bulk of my fare lately. And writing Weekly Exercises once a week–a thousand words at most every week–is definitely not enough to scratch that itch.

I don’t know when I’ll be able to start writing–might be today after classes, might be Sunday after homework and before dinner, might even be after I turn in my second-to-last essay next week–but it should be soon. And when I start writing, you can expect some very odd weather around central Ohio, because I’ll be writing up a storm! I plan to finish the first draft of Video Rage and get several more chapters of Laura Horn under my belt. Plus an article or two for Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors, and my usual Weekly Exercises, and I’ll feel as close to normal as I can get again.

So watch your weather bulletins, people. Until then, I wish you all a wonderful weekend. Good luck to the Ohio State Buckeyes as they take on Illinois tomorrow, and I hope we all get the chance to sleep in and rest a little.

Blog on you later!

Rami Ungar The Writer

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