EllyWithAWhy is trying to defeat the blank page...
Well, I attempted my first book about three years ago, needless to say it fizzled out miserably. However, on 27th December 2007, I started my current one, which, with a bit of luck and a following wind, might, HOPEFULLY get published.
I got the idea when playing the PS2 game, Jak 3. It’s not a rip off from the game or a copy or anything, but at some points in the game, the character (Jak) grows wings and can fly (it’s a really cool game, you should try it). Also, this character Jak has a bad-ass alter ego he can’t control, and it really sets him apart from everyone and makes it hard for him to be with people, so I was just thinking what it would be like to be like that in the real world. And so, obviously, both these things formed into an idea for a character while I was hopelessly stuck on one of the flying levels. (And I bet you think you can guess what the character is like huh? But no! he only has one of the obvious characteristics; he didn’t quite turn out the way I was originally aiming for, but hey, that’s fine, he’s great how he is.)
Then, while I was grooming one of my horses (the ever glamourous life of a writer eh?) I was trying to think of a name for this character, and I really really wanted to call him Virus. I kept telling myself it was stupid, but then I saw the book by Chris Wooding where the main character is called Poison, so I just thought, sod it, and called him Virus anyway.
A couple of week later, just before Christmas, we were given a test in school on how good a citizen we are. Well, I was outraged that they could test us on that. I tried to refuse to take it, but I ended up taking it anyway, on pain of disembowellment/decapitation/garotting etc. The teacher reassured me time and again that it didn’t matter, and it was just the government being curious, and whatever we put wouldn’t affect us in any way, but it got me thinking, what if it did matter? What if everything hung on it? What if the rest of your life was literally controlled by the marks of one test? So yeah, I bet you can see where this is going. But you’d be wrong, that was what I orignially started out with, but in the intervening weeks between thinking of all this and actually starting writing, a lot changed. And no, I’m not going to give yo details of it all, because what if someone pinches the idea? But anyway, I’ve ranted for ages, and you get the general gist methinks….
