A career suggestion

Between ads, census, chance encounters, and young people at work, I think a great career choice these days would be geospatial information system stuff, especially if the student combined it with studies of communications (journalism perhaps) and maybe a regional minor. In the end, the region doesn't matter; it's just a way to learn how to apply the GIS stuff to something substantial, but with all the GPS, census, weather, and other data being collected every which way around us, any company with sense is going to be hiring the GIS analyst type who can make order of the data. And they'll be looking for people who can communicate the technical gibberish to customers, sales people, and managers quickly and effectively. It's a rare skill combination with endless demand soon to come.

characters

I considered, especially on days when keeping the prisoners all straight becomes hard, or when I can't quite figure how much and what to do with everyone, of having fewer prisoners to accompany Candice. Part of the reason for adding more in the first place was to offer contrast between scenes, not only in the content, like how the Cerel treat the military or govies vs Candice, or how they treat men and women, but in the texture and flow. Many scenes with Candice are one-on-one discourses, but as fun as that is to write and for some people to read, the reader needs a break. According to one study, we have about a ten minute attention span, after which point the topic can stay the same but something needs to change. In writing, that can be pace, mood, the flow of a discussion, a shift between dialog and narrative, scene description and action, emotion and physical activity. I figure one way to achieve the same, and give opportunity for those kinds of changes, is to have scenes focused on Candice and some Cerel, and scenes with several characters chiming in. The group scenes can be messy, but if they come out well, they can add a richness of texture that I don't think scenes with fewer prisoners could achieve.

Looking for fellow writers

Well, another attempt with surprisingly limited success. This time I started looking for Science Fiction and Fantasy groups that might have a writing interest. i found a couple but the majority have hardly any online presence besides their web page, where members might get alittle information about ongoing activities. Most didn't even have an obvious way to make contact except by going to the posted meeting place and time. Naturally several were for the students of a given university. I hear so much about social software in many forms, but really it still comes down to face-to-face contact. A good sign: I fear that the young generation is so used to communicating on a machine, I begin to wonder if they know how to communicate face-to-face. Apparently they still do that, too, more than online as a way of meeting strangers, it seems.

I tried the social software route, too, but despite many references to being able to find people, not as easy as they make it sound. I found a science fiction writers group and science fiction and fantasy writers group on Facebook. One is brand new, the other low activity, and neither the semi-local groups that I was lead to believe were plentiful and easily found: obviously not by the route I tried, but then, I'm much more a novice at Facebook than even blogging, and I'm still on the beginning end of that, obviously.

Anyone has any suggestions for more ways to share and interchange with fellow writers, your ideas are welcome here!

changing scenes

I recently read that our attention span is about ten minutes if there isn't some change in style, for example in the nature or focus of a lecture, a switch to video from slides, verbal or reading, topic change different enough to re-generate interest. i figure the end of Chapter 8 and the beginning of chapter 9 make a sufficient jump i nsetting and focus and the nature of the interactions, but it brings along a whole new set of challenges that I'm not sure whether I've adequately managed. The explostion of characters, the chaos of multi-character discourse, with one side of the conversation coming from disparate voices and unknown characters... A few are characters I'd like to use again but this is definately not a forum for a proper introduction. Quick and light and unpausing for awhile, and I'm not sure that the last few paragraphs don't grind it too thoroughly to a halt, or whether they are a timely change...