Zen Master: Blog

(This should have been posted in September, 2013)

This isn't working. The various authors have absolutely no incentive for compromise. Do I need to point out that we do this for free, as a hobby? None of us get paid to write. Okay, some of us get paid to write -I'm writing technical instructions for my employer right now- but none of us are getting paid to write Swarm stories. There is no supervisor holding a paycheck saying "get along or else".
Many of the authors are willing to work towards a group concensus, but every one of them is an author in his own right, and every one of them has their own sacred cow which must be worshipped. This is not a difficult task, it is by definition impossible. It is not even theoretically possible to get group concensus on everything we need. As I put in a FAQ for the author's list, there is an arbiter available, but we don't want to go there if we can avoid it. The Thinking Horndog owns this story system, and he is the last word on how we do things. However, we want to be big boys here. We don't want to annoy him without good reason. He can use tweezers, but he can also use an axe....

(This should have been posted in May, 2013)

What I'm trying to do is write a "background" story, that shows how this whole Swarm Universe mess started. Using that as a framework, I want to describe various things like how the two-caste system got started, what the ships look like, how a replicator works, etc.
Most of the author's group are very supportive. This isn't a story I'm writing. It is really more like a committee that is deciding things. I'm just the scribe that write it all down and maybe pretties it up a bit so people will read it.
My working title is "First Command", as I'm trying to tell it from the viewpoint of the guy who gets chosen to be Earth's first starship commander. He is learning all this stuff, so I have an excuse to write about figuring out how it all works.

(This should have been posted in April, 2013. At this point I was positive that I should have started a blog earlier. This stuff would have been a lot easier.)

There is too much story-series background, what we call the "Swarm Cycle Canon", that is unknown for me to finish this story right now. When I ask the author's group about something, I often get a useful reply that I can put to work, and I move on.
Unfortunately, this is not always true. More and more, when I ask how something works or _should_ work, I get three different answers, any one of which is usable, and the discussion devolves into an argument. Every viewpoint is supported by previously-published stories. No matter what I write, I will violate something said in a previous story.
Not that the reader cares what my problem is, you just want to know when chapter 4 is coming out. The straight answer is "I don't know. I am putting IC on hold while we figure out what is going to be canon."

Did anyone notice that my previous blog entry said 2012 instead of 2013? I have this stuff written, I'm just trying to figure out a way to post it all on a continuing blog without looking like an idiot for not doing it when I should have.

(This should have been posted in March, 2012, when I realized that IC was going to have to be re-written, and could not be completely published yet. This was about the time that I realized that I had been wrong about the usefulness of an author's blog, and started seriously writing down what I should have been putting in it.)

I'm having problems with the Swarm author's group. Not their fault, as every one of them should rightfully be proud of their accomplishments and I'm the new guy. The underlying problem is that the owner, Thinking Horndog, originally envisioned this as a short series that allowed him to get some stress out as he went through some unpleasant times in his personal life. Apparently his series touched a nerve, and became popular enough that other authors started asking permission to play in his sandbox. He gave permission, moved on to other projects, and by his own admission sat back to enjoy reading Swarm stories that he didn't have to write.
The problem is that there was never any well-thought out background and historical outline that the various authors had to abide by. Each author wrote what he (or she) wanted to, and whenever the story called for it, something got invented. Of course the other authors would jump on the new stuff.
Time went on, and things started to get awkward. Joe can't write about the invention of (X) because Sally wrote about (X) being in use already in story (Y), and her version -already published, accepted, and thus 'canon'- doesn't do what he needs for his story. The authors don't just pass their writing around for help, they NEED to, to avoid inconsistencies.
And writing stuff that doesn't violate anything in any of the stories is getting harder. To my loyal readers, if there are any, I hereby apologize for how long this is taking.

(This should have been posted in December, 2012, when I started posting Independent Command)

I'm writing a story set in Thinking Horndog's shared "Swarm Cycle". I think I'm far enough along to start publishing it. No, it's not complete yet, but I should be able to finish it soon. I can't do the ending until I get more familiar with the Swarm universe, to make sure I don't say anything that doesn't fit. The original ending I had planned back when the it was HonorVerse fanfic will clearly not do.
I am sending each chapter through the Swarm Author's list to make sure everything I write is, if not exactly what they expect, is at least plausible and acceptable. While they are extremely helpful, they are all just as touchy as I am, and they all know that their individual view is the only correct one. This may take a while.