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My Books

Interveiw with Dahskay Onlore, Main Character of The Stardrift Trilogy

Now things get fun. Today, I’m staging an interview with The Stardrift Trilogy’s main character, Dahskay Onlore. Dahskay Onlore is an apprenticed radio astronomer working as an intern at her father’s Observatory in the mountains on the planet of Finzar. In Earth-years, she would be about sixteen when the story starts.

What are your favorite and least favorite things about your job at the observatory?

For one thing, I love the setting. The Ematosk Mountains are beautiful, and the emotional climate at the observatory is so peaceful and contemplative most of the time. It’s kind of a vacation setting. Then there’s the whole astronomy aspect. I love our subject-matter. It’s all so huge and fantastical, and the fact that our sole purpose is to listen to what the heavenly bodies are saying…that’s cool. (Laughs.) If you can’t see how cool that is, I can’t help you.

  Things that aren’t as cool would be the boring technical things and the computer work. I don’t like technology very much. And then there’s the fact that you’re kind of isolated up there and stuck with the same bunch of people all the time. That sometimes gets old.

 

How do you choose who to hang out with?

Well, when you’re working, you don’t often get to choose, but during breaks and the off-time we get every four days, I prefer to be with my brothers. Otherwise there are several girls that live in my dorm who I like. I like good communicators, quiet people, people with interesting stories. Some of the other interns aren’t really going into astronomy, so there are some that I have to search around for common ground with. But for the most part, a lot of the people at the observatory share that interest. It’s nice to be with people who have a passion for what you love.

 

Do you find it easy to trust people, and get along?

Yeah, usually, I’d say I do. I like to see people in reference to their experiences and know them for who they are. A lot of people dismiss other people too easily as this or that, and walk away, or run away, accordingly. I try to be patient and learn about people, and try to assume the best of them. I found it really pays off.

 

Do you consider yourself a heroic person?

I don’t know…I guess it depends on how you define a hero. Standing up for what’s right under pressure and standing by the people you love are important, I guess. Those are things I try to do. I would be willing to do whatever I had to do to help people who needed me. Self-sacrifice and hope are probably the virtues that I would say define a hero. I want to be that strong, but I don’t know for sure if I am, right now.

 

Do you think individuals are important in the grand scheme of things?

Wow…big question. As an astronomer, you spend so much time in light of the giant realm we call the universe. Really, you would think that people and their individual struggles and achievements would shrink by comparison. Sometimes I wish they would. But yes, I think people are infinitely important–as important as the universe is huge. It’s a mistake to separate individuals from the grand design. Everyone’s an essential part of it.

 

Do you believe in a higher power?

Yes. I’ve always believed in God, but there’s something about astronomy, and space travel as well, that just keeps emphasizing it. You can’t feel alone out there. I don’t really like space travel, but, with all the comfort and familiarity stripped away, that’s when you really know that it isn’t just your personal culture, your hometown, your planet. You get out there tens of millions of miles from all that, and your head clears, and you know it’s not your imagination.

 

If you could send a message to everyone in the universe, what would you say?

I’d tell them to listen. Listening is so underrated. People don’t seem to have the curiosity or the imagination to search for what might be calling them. You never can know what your destiny is really meant to be. Mostly just because it’s so celestial, and so huge, you can’t take it in. But if you listen, you might get some hints of what’s coming for you. And it’s not something bound to your home planet. Your life was never meant to be that small.    
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My Books

The Publishing Story

And what a long story it is. I started writing The Stardrift Trilogy way back in 2008. Back then, I wasn’t actually planning to publish. I didn’t expect anyone outside my family to read my story. I was fourteen then, so that seemed a little bit grandiose to me.

But here’s how I started my publishing adventures. For anybody who doesn’t know, there are three ways you can get a book published these days. You can try to sell it to a traditional publisher (traditional publishing), you can do the entire thing yourself (self-publishing), or you can buy the services of a publisher and keep the rights (subsidy-publishing.)

  I chose to subsidy publish a bit rashly, I suppose. I found a subsidy-publisher called Westbow Press that would produce my books and distribute them in four months—that was about two years ago. There were really two reasons I chose to subsidy-publish: it was faster than traditional, and I doubted that I could market my books successfully to a traditional press.

So what happened to the four months? A number of things. When I decided to publish, I had already written the whole trilogy. To cut expenses, I intended to have all three books produced as a single volume. So, when I submitted them to Westbow, the three were one document.

The books passed content evaluation, meaning they found no copyrighted material, nothing that was against their publishing standards, and that the manuscript was legible. But there was a problem: they didn’t have the equipment to bind a novel that thick. So, I had to divide the document into two volumes, and re-submit it.

  At this point, I think there was some kind of miscommunication, because they thought they had to run the whole evaluation over again, even though they had already seen everything the first time through. This set the time back again, and to make matters worse (and very confusing) it didn’t pass the second time.

Turns out Westbow, in the middle of my project, decided to tighten up their standards of violence in the books they produced—cutting it down to about a PG, or possibly even G level. There is some blood and violence in the trilogy, and after struggling with attempts at down-playing it in revision, I realized I couldn’t reduce it any further without disfiguring the story.

  So, we pulled out and went over to the secular Abbott Press. But time was set back again. We picked slowly through the process with multiple strange little setbacks. But, at long last, the project was finished.

  That was my rather awkward break into the publishing world. I’m eyeing out both self-publishing options and a small Christian traditional press called Enclave Press for my up-coming novels. My hope is to start to establish myself with the Stardrift Trilogy. If you have any interest, check out “books” page on this blog, or simply search for The Stardrift Trilogy by A. L. Buehrer on Amazon, Barns and Nobel, or the Abbott Press Bookstore.
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My Books

IT’S AVAILIBLE!

Well, The Stardrift Trilogy is now available to the public. Spread the news. You can buy the books on Amazon Barnes &Noble, and on Abbott Press Bookstore. Read it, review it, enjoy it if you can! Seven years in the making, and it’s finally here!!!

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My Books Snippet

Snippet!

There was a worrisome fluttering and clanging and then silence. Presently, the seabird’s head appeared at the other end of the shelves. Without a thought, Dahskay sneaked up on it and caught it before it could fully emerge. She pulled it out gently despite its clawed feet clinging to unseen anchors behind the shelves. She tucked in the enormous wings and held it firmly against her side.

  “You got it!” whispered Cahathel in amazement, rushing to open the door.

  She glanced nervously down at the bird’s long, ponderously hooked bill as she carried it to the exit.  It didn’t threaten her with it. It just blinked and gazed steadily ahead.

  Just outside the door, she crouched down and let go of it. It fussily rearranged its wings and turned walking into the wind a couple of steps. Before it took off, it looked back at Dahskay through clear gray eyes.

  As the enormous spread of wings climbed away into the stormy sky, Zaarrveck muttered, “Strange, most of them have dark eyes.”
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Learning from Novels

Learning from Novels: Agatha Christie’s “The Seven Dials Mystery”

There’s a reason Christie is such a big name in murder mysteries. I wouldn’t describe myself as a huge whodunit junkie, but her work stands out brilliantly from all that I’ve read. The Seven Dials Mystery follows the mysterious deaths of two young men on the grounds of Chimneys, a huge estate being rented out be the protagonist’s father. The clues are a missing alarm clock, an unfinished letter, and the last words of one of the victims as he dies.
  Christie’s red-herrings are particularly good. She knows all about playing on a reader’s assumptions. The main character is engaging, and well-developed. I would never name a character “Bundle”, but, to each their own.
  There are an awful lot of characters introduced in the first couple of chapters of the book. It’s a good thing when a mystery has a lot of suspects, but I would complain that they were dealt a little fast, and there are a few that blend together. Most of her characters, though not described extensively, were given one or two distinguishing marks that made it possible to file them, mentally. The story starts with a prank involving eight young people, and I found myself juggling their names and faces for a while, worried that I would be expected to remember every one. Actually, only one or two of them were important to the story.
  Another thing that I found confusing was the fact that the main character wasn’t introduced until after all that. She wasn’t even one of the people present at the beginning. For a while, I didn’t know who I was supposed to follow around.
  I would rant on about the plot developments being flat out unfair to the reader, but, looking back, it was all quite clever. The worst of it was Bundle was barking up the wrong tree the whole time. You naturally assume that the main character is pretty close to getting it write near the end of the novel—but how it all turned out was nothing like what she thought.
  I really enjoyed reading the book. I’ll be reading more Agatha Christie as soon as I get my hands on it.
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My Books Snippet

Snippet!

On the other side of the door, she stopped short and stared. The chamber’s ceiling was as high as that of the exterior hallways and it was punctuated by skylights shaped like elongated teardrops streaming from the highest point in the vaulting. Stormy blue-ish light flowed down from these windows and lit the soaring labyrinth of shelves and cabinets that kept the temple’s some twelve-million documents. The air was cool and felt like it somehow came from outside. There wasn’t a sound to be heard.
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Avoiding Cliches Fiction Writers' Advice

Avoiding Cliches: Don’t Do The Prophesy

And don’t take my titles too literally, either. The prophecy is a very standard device in sci-fi and fantasy, particularly. It’s really not a bad thing in itself, and I used it in the Stardrift Trilogy and am using it in The Art of Lightplay, the fantasy I’m currently writing. Like practically all clichés, the prophecy can go from a predictable bore to a satisfying thrill with a little twisting.
  Authors have different ways of handling prophecies. Some write them, without context, in the beginning of their book, before chapter one. Some don’t bring them up until the plot is already moving. Some show the prophesy being told for the first time in the beginning of their story. The placement makes little difference. Do whatever you want.
  People get particularly lazy when it comes to the actual writing of the thing. Here’s where things get really predictable if you’re not careful. Things to watch out for:

·         Make sure you use natural-sounding language that matches the way people speak in your story. Please don’t use, or attempt to use Elizabethan English if you have no reason to.
·         Unless the prophesy was written by a poet—preferably one who had no idea they were writing a prophesy—please don’t rhyme it. Why would it rhyme?
·         Don’t use the term “Chosen One.” Think of something else.
·         Don’t have an old woman say it.

I could go on, but I would rather move on to talking about ingenious ways to twist it. I wouldn’t advocate throwing the whole prophecy device out of literature. People like prophesy, for some reason. And in a time when people are beginning to think history is just a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, I think it’s inspiring to know that the human spirit still wants there to be a greater destiny.
  So, ideas for manipulating the cliché to surprise people. First of all, let me say that the best model for prophesy in literature comes from the bible. The original “Chosen One” prophesy—the oldest in the world, originated there. If I wasn’t a Christian, the accuracy and detail of biblical prophesies would be one of the things that freaked me out.
  Great ideas inspired by biblical prophesy:

·         One of my favorites—the reoccurring fulfillment. The major prophesies in the bible are rarely fulfilled just once, on just one level. Some of the old testament prophets appeared to be referring to their own lifetimes—and later, Jesus Christ would fulfill them again—and in the future, some will occur yet again.
·         The blind prophet. Like I mentioned above, sometimes prophets may even seem to be referring to their own personal circumstances—but later, something cosmic happens that sheds new light on their words.
·         Occasionally, what people believed to be poetic wording turns out to be quite literal. Other times, what people expect to be literal actually implied something else
·         Sometimes, a prophesy is presented as a story. This happens constantly in the bible. The reader isn’t even told that the event—typically a true story—is going to have significance later on—then it does.

Prophesies are good ways to keep a reader guessing. They serve as foreshadows, and riddles. If the wording is more abstract, or symbolic, the reader really doesn’t get it until they look back on events. That won’t keep them from trying. And just like in real prophesy, the trying is half the fun.
  So, enjoy writing prophesies. But remember, they take mental effort. Writing a story about prophesy being fulfilled is almost as strategic as writing a murder mystery. Give it the time and thought it needs to be epic.
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My Books Snippet

Snippet!

Dahskay slipped suddenly from the gentle hand of dreamless sleep. It was funny how every time she had awakened from any amount of sleep on this mission, she always expected to be in her room. What was even stranger was the fact that it wasn’t her room at the OAOF on Clilltar. Not even the girls’ dorm on Finzar, but her childhood home that she imagined she would see when she opened her eyes.
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Fiction Writers' Advice

Creating Atmosphere

One of the greatest absences I sense in modern novels, poems, and short-stories is atmosphere. When did we lose it? Where did it go? And…why??? I don’t know that I could answer any of these questions. All I know is it’s gone, and I want it back.

   So, what exactly is this lost element, atmosphere? Atmosphere is the underlying mood or tone of a piece of art. It’s what flavors and colors a scene, or a moment, making it more than the sum of its parts. In film, the soundtrack, lighting, set, and movement of the characters are powerful contributors to atmosphere. In paintings, the composition, palette, and focus play parts. In music, the instruments, dynamics, articulation, and tempo make all the difference.

  Atmosphere really exists independently of subject-matter. A good author can take a scene in which the same characters are present, doing the same things, but make the reader feel any number of ways about it. The magic is in well-chosen details.

  The atmosphere of a scene is a combination of physical and emotional elements. Look at the scene through the eyes of your characters in reference to what their currently going through. If your main character is walking down a beach, whether they are waiting for a boat that they are confident will arrive soon, or one that they’ve heard rumors may have gone down earlier that day.

  Supposing it’s the exact same beach, the exact same time of day, and under the exact same weather conditions in both scenarios, what makes the difference? The main character’s focus, and the narrator’s descriptions set the atmosphere in this situation. Here’s the narrative for the more positive scenario:  

  He kicked along the shore, bouncing pebbles into the springy, flashing wavelets. For a few minutes he watched the minnows scatter, vaguely aware of the jeering laughter of the gulls as they took off with each other’s fish bones and trash. When the rumble of a boat faded in, he looked up, shading his eyes against the blazing sunshine. That wasn’t them, but that one scudding in off the hazy horizon could be.

And the more worrisome scene:

  A few paces from the docks, he stopped and scanned through the tethered boats. Gulls screamed through the heavy air as one by one, all the boats in the bay docked. The sun glared on the agitated water, but the horizon was dark and the incoming craft seemed to emerge from behind a dark blue curtain. Another boat droned in. His eyes snapped to it. No. That still wasn’t them.

  Some of the details are the same. Some differ. The things that stayed in both scenes were described differently. In the first scene, he idly kicked stones and noticed minnows—in the second, he got right to the point, searching for the boat. The “springy, flashing wavelets” of the first scene became “agitated water” in the second.  First, the horizon was merely hazy. Second, it was a mysterious barrio between him and those he waited for.

  Try writing some scenes like this. Try writing the same scene—possibly even one with the same dialogue—and putting it in a different context. Use the atmosphere to convey the feelings of the scenes differently.
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Snippet

Snippet!

They only saw one planet on their way out of the ecliptic. Silita drifted far to the starboard side. Ahead, the stars stared blankly at them, saying quite clearly, “What are you doing here?”

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