Thought Processes and Research behind the response for Chuck Wendig’s terribleminds’ 28 September 2012 blog flash fiction challenge: The Epic Game of Aspects Redux

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Thoughts on the Randomly Rolled Challenge Elements

Okay, so I nearly gave up when I rolled for this week’s challenge. I rolled 20 for ‘Sub-Genre’ which resulted in ‘fan fiction’. I have never written fan fiction in my life before, so my mind went a total blank and I didn’t think I could do it. I just about gave up then and there.
As you can see I didn’t, just couldn’t help rolling that dice twice more and receiving a 16 and a 3 for my efforts. At first, I was going to use them for an alternative Sub-Genres response, but that felt too much like cheating so I just went with the results, in order for the next two categories: 16 = ‘Family Thrown Apart!’ as a Conflict/Problem and 3 = Sea Monster for the Element to Include.
Work Time
I started writing my first draft and researching at 12:39, 1 October 2012, Australian Eastern Standard Time. I finished the first draft 13:42, 3 October 2012. I spent four hours on it on the 1st and three-and-a-half hours on the 3rd. I just couldn’t get near it on the 2nd. That time includes the half-hour walk I took on the third to think, the research, the pruning to get it back to 1,000 words, the actual writing and uploading it to my blog.

Sub-Genre: Fan Fiction

Having decided to stick by what I had first rolled for this challenge, I had to work out what I was a fan enough of to write fan fic for, what exactly what fan fic was, and how I was going to go about writing it… so I went to the Conflux 8 convention while I thought it out.
My first thought was that I might write about Fildenstar, an awesome speculative fiction/songwriting sci-fi band, but it just didn’t gel right. It’s not that they’re not interesting enough to write about; I just didn’t want to infringe on their material or music or them. Note 1: I have trouble writing about real people and ‘other people’s stuff’ – a lot of trouble. That was a bit of a dilemma. I went back to the thinking board.
It took me until late Sunday night to go back to remember I had started to write some short fiction for an adventure setting that grabbed me a long time ago—Broncosaurus Rex by Goodman Games. With the Conflict and Element set, this story was going to have to be something new, fresh out of my head, so to speak.
My search for a better understanding of what was meant by fan-fiction led me to the following sites:


So with the sub-genre settled in my head, I figured I could write something that at least resembled fan fiction in that it was:

  • Set in someone else’s world; and
  • Unendorsed by the original creator of that world.

Conflict/Problem: Family Torn Apart

Because I knew I had to include a sea monster, I knew my story would be set on or near a body of water. With the family being torn apart, I decided that some kind of boat wreck had to be involved, and that my protagonist would be looking for her family. Now, all I needed was a place to wreck the boat and some kind of sea.
Fortunately, on the map I have for Broncosaurus Rex (found in the Cretasus Adventure Guide), I discovered an inland sea, with a particularly treacherous area near a river mouth and some bayous. And it has dinosaurs… did I mention how much I liked dinosaurs?
Now, losing a family is not quite like having it torn apart, so I had to decide exactly what the tearing consisted of, and that gave me my main character’s dilemma.
I started writing the opening scene before I even knew what my sea monster was, because that would make looking for a suitable creature easier, or so I hoped.

Incidental Story Element 1: Paddle Steamer

I hit my first uh-oh moment about a paragraph into writing. I wanted the main character to find the wreckage of a paddle steamer. I wrote that the wheel had pounded itself to bits and the boiler had blown up… and then I decided that I better work out where the boiler was so I could have a big hole in the right part of the boat. Up until then, all I knew about paddle steamers was that they had a big wheel on the side and boilers. Boy, was I in for a surprise.
For one thing, paddle steamers came in a variety of shapes and sizes. Secondly, there were steamers with wheels at the rear or out of view. Thirdly, they were used all over the world, England, Australia, Europe and parts of the United States other than the Mississippi.
Here is where my riverboat research led me:


Including a steamboat made it easier to live with writing something ‘not entirely mine’ because I could always change it later to suit the steampunk universe I’m planning, and it helped me move towards the goal of developing certain elements in that universe, such as learning about the technology I wanted to use there.

Element to Include: Sea Monster

Finally decided on a monster. It has some of its roots in real life and some of its roots in my head. Probably not a good combination, but these creatures make sense to me.
My research led me to the following web sites:

Location: Canberra ACT, Australia

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