About A Northern Heart

This story is really an interesting thing. I never quite know where it’s going to go. I mean, I have the outline of the plot and the eventual end of the story in my head, but I really don’t know what’s in-between, or what the final decision will be. I just know that there will be a final decision. So I’m taking a very wandering path to get there, and exploring the story from whatever angles are interesting to me. Eventually, I’ll rework the story, reorder the events, expand or revise sections and details, and basically turn it into a more integrated work. For now…I wander–to figure it out myself.

The tone of the story changes from chapter to chapter. I notice it, but it doesn’t bother me most of the time. It depends on what mood I’m in when I write a chapter. Some are more upbeat and ironic, and others are more epic and heroic. I haven’t written depressive chapters yet, to my mind. Maybe I will at some point. Usually my sense of humor and interest in the story sways between a sort of wry humor and that sweeping epic I mentioned, and so the chapters follow along.

The story itself is has sort of duality to it. It’s struggling between the two threads of epic fantasy and crossover fantasy, and these two genres are not easy to mix. The modern element tends to defuse the epic element, since it constantly floats at the back of the reader’s mind that the fantasy world is fantasy while the modern world is reality, despite whatever solidity the fantasy world obtains. That solidity is really the only way I can think of to combine the modern and epic elements. If I make the fantasy world real enough, it displaces the modern element and the reader should focus on the epic element instead.

I don’t want to remove the modern element, either. At least not at the moment. I think it adds an important facet to the story. The heck if I know what that facet is sometimes. It just seems like it should be there.

I never know what exactly I’m going to write. Characters seem to create themselves; events seem to happen because they have to happen; it’s like I’m just a conduit for my imagination and I don’t actively think of what should go into the story. Instead I just think about how best to describe it and what should follow what. The rest of it seems to happen by itself.

Speaking of imagination…that’s why I write. It lets me imagine a world in such concrete detail that I might as well be there. It takes me hours to write a chapter, and even if it seems like the chapter is abrupt to read, the events in the chapter seemed to unfold slowly before me in real time.

If you have feedback, especially about the imaginative flow of the story, do leave it for me. I might change something, or work to explain something more fully, if you point it out to me. If you don’t, I might not even notice. I won’t always agree with you of course, but I will seriously consider what you say.

In truth, I encourage everyone to write their stories and say what they wish to say. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and while I may disagree with that opinion I am a strong supporter for a diversity of opinions on any subject. The more the merrier, as long as everyone is capable of a coherent argument for why or why not a certain point is valid. I don’t mind illogical opinions, as long as the opinions are noted as illogical and a matter of personal taste. I do mind illogic being used as if it were logic. That’s simple nonsense and offends the rhetorician in me. With that said, I should note that I still admire, from a rhetorical and personal angle, a well-crafted and cunning argument that incorporates specific uses of illogic in order to convince its audience. I’m illogical too, you see, and I like it that way. It makes things more interesting, and I have no interest in being a dull robot chained by logical algorithms. Let’s instead skip a few stones across the cosmos and see where they land. Furthermore, I highly approve of writing as a creative outlet even if I don’t think the writing is very good.

Like most people, I suppose. I’m writing this story for myself and for a couple of people close to me. I love it when other people like it, and it encourages me to keep writing when I get positive feedback, but the story itself is for a specific purpose…mostly as a creative outlet.

It just is. I like it. I have fun with it. I hope you do too. If not, then just go away and leave your snarky comments for another day. I will ruthlessly delete them anyway (not that I’ve had to actually do that to any comments yet, besides spam).

You’d be surprised how much spam comes by a website…trackback comments and all kinds of things. It entails a lot of clicking and deleting (or it would if it weren’t mostly automated). It’s kind of like an electronic deer hunter…. Shoot the big buck to get on the scoreboard. I just wonder what the big buck is supposed to be in this case…. [And here I wander off aimlessly onto another train of thought]

Here’s the old stuff: [Ramble on] Northern Heart is written chapter by chapter as it’s posted. Unlike a more traditional publication format, which demands a certain brevity, this means that the novel can go into greater detail in specific chapters, and dwell for longer on the connective material between plot scenes. For instance, the actual history of Allen is being elaborated from the beginning, from when he appears in the world, rather than being an amorphous “past” to which the reader is referred. This means I’m ignoring the old adage “in late, out early,” that tells us to focus as close to the action as possible…at least in part. I’m making the action a longer narrative. No editors around here to tell me to chop out 40,000 words.

This makes it a real story chronologically, as it were, with a long and natural progression from beginning to end, and it means that the creative reworking of plot and story (different terms, if used specifically) is somewhat absent, since the end isn’t written yet and I haven’t rewoven those two separate threads.

The plot is how the events of the work are shown to the reader. The story is those events in their chronological order. Just think of the movie Hero, any of Tarantino’s movies, or Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury, and the difference between the two is sharp.

I haven’t decided how to tangle it up yet, but when I finish the first book, I might. We’ll see.

The details of each chapter are created during the writing, though an overall plot controls the narrative. The pacing changes from scene to scene depending on the interest and importance of the events. As long as each chapter adheres to the overall framework, it works. I have a lot of scribbles around on notes and in Word documents, plus things in my head that are just “the world” or “the story.” [/ramble]

If you like the story, leave me a comment.

Feel free to remind me if I lose track of something and forget to come back to it, or if there are typos in the text.

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Acknowledgements To

Ryan, for all the help

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FAQ

If you ask some, I’ll do my best to answer them.

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Other Information

Copyright Notice:

I, Chad Writtenfire, am releasing my work on this site (writtenfire.com and its subdomains) under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license. See the Creative Commons website for an official explanation at Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. See specific details below.

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This work (A Northern Heart), and any content posted on writtenfire.com or its subdomains, may contain mature themes. By registering for an account at writtenfire.com or its subdomains, or by proceeding past the main page to any page except this informational page, or by posting any comments to writtenfire.com or its subdomains, you agree that you are of legal age in your jurisdiction to view mature material and you agree that writtenfire.com and its subdomains are not responsible for any actions that you take. Particularly, if you are under 13 years of age, you may not continue to the contents of the website.

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Feedback Policy

I love feedback. It’s great, and it lets me know what you think of the story. However, in my legal interests–so that no one can make a comment and later claim that something I wrote was derived from a comment they made–I must say here that by using this website and posting feedback and comments on this website and story, you agree to waive all rights to those suggestions and all rights to compensation for them.

This policy has to be up here just in case someone tries to sue me for compensation after having pointed out that I missed a comma or gapped a word in a post or because they think something they said in a comment was similar to something that I later wrote and that they should own the rights to my story because of it.

I am not going to steal your ideas. If you guess at events that will come up in the next chapter…good! I’m thrilled that you’re interested and guessing.

So please do give me feedback. If you give exceptional feedback, I will add your name to the acknowledgments page.

Copyright Explained

My work on this website is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Click the link for an official explanation.

Specifically, this means:

1) You are free to download and share this work with anyone you like, as long as you include my copyright [URL address, my name, title of work, and date copied from site], do not alter the content of the work, and do not earn any profit from it.

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4) The no-derivative works clause means that you may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. This includes writing any works yourself based in this universe, etc. See clause 5 for a limited exemption.

5) You may create fanart and fanfiction for this work, provided that you do not attach it to the work or imply that it is my work in any way. However, by creating fanfiction and fanart and using this universe, these characters, this magic, or creating anything related to this work in any way, you agree to waive all rights to that work. This doesn’t mean you give me those rights (except to publish the story on my site if you submit it, and to move it around, reformat it, etc.), but simply that you can’t do anything legally with the story (like publish it or sell it) without my permission. It also means no one can claim fanfiction inspired a chapter or sequel that I write.

Fanart and Fanfiction

For those interested in fanart and fanfiction, simply send me an email and file or link and I would be happy to host them somewhere on this site, subject to my moderation. See the policy above.

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