The Fading Light

Thanks, Casper for the plug.

 

You're welcome, D. I'm just doing my part as a fan.

UP!

 

W00T! Totally nifty, dude!

 

Sorry, it won't be as long as I wanted it to be.

All right. As Casper said, I had a lot to read. And though I know this saga isn't finished yet, I have to start at the beginning to give this story the credit it deserves. When I first read Nothing Else Matters I almost refused to commit to this story. Now I'm glad I didn't. Not only because of Casper's humour, which I love dearly, and not only because of the stunning and incredible plots and subplots he creates in his spare-time (I wish I had as much). No, it was because of teh characters. Each single one is so very real, that you find yourself bearing witrh them every single scene. Which is always an incredible achievement for an author. Casper manages magnificently, as all of us lurking around here know.

Right.

As for The Fading Light, we have a continuous downward slide toward the catastrophe that will befall the galaxy all too soon, I fear. We have the old cast from the Dark Hope, and don't we just love 'em all? Hehe, yep, even Sidious, at intervalls. Okay, we might detest Pirus, and certainly Prophet, but it's teh good guys that count, isn't it? And they surely go through a lot in this part of the saga. Cruelty has a new name, and it begins with a C and ends with an E.

I almost cried when Enothchild said good-bye to his foster father, though Yoda as Enothchild's father? That image needs some getting used to. Thanks for all the emotional scenes, the fun-stuff (Dizzy!), and the action-packed fight scenes and, last but not least, the powerful magic that had a special sizzle between Prophet and Juna.

I loved the reunion between Enothchild and Naressa.

Dizzy calling Juna a Nubian Banshee? Hehe. I like that.

Sidious? I knew it was Sidious the moment I read that Juna had vanished.

Yep, you can see I've learned to second-guess you at times, Casper, but I sure hope Sidious won't do what Nebula suggested doing to Juna! But no, I don't quite believe it. And so on we go, hunting for the treasure taht is hope, even if it is a Dark Hope. Hah! Whoever heard of a story ending with a cliffhanger? Well, I have, but then I was also dying for the sequel!!!!!

So, I have to be patient, and hope I will have more time to keep up.

What more can I say?

*Whispers* Actually, I often find myself thinking that I'd love to found a publishing house only to get more people to notice this incredible stuff!!!!! Perhaps, one day ....

 

I could have never asked for a more honest view (not review; there's a difference) of the story material.

It's tough, sometimes, to read a story because of those elements that do really make it a joy to read. When it comes to character-driven fiction, and its no surprise here that's what I'm driving at here obviously, its the hardest to attach yourself to because in some way you can either relate to the characters or see them as being very, very real and compelling; the latter making it all the more harder at times to read what may or will happen to them, especially if its for the worse.

I was going to wait a little to cover this, but I guess I can cover it a little right now. One of the drawbacks to the SW prequels is the fact we know what's going to happen; it is the greatest anti-climatic movie event in film history. Therefore the responsibility of a storyteller in this case isn't just to reveal those facts that lead to what we know and introduce characters and such but have a ton of compelling elements that make those who are going to see, or read, it a reason to care about it.

Right now as far as the movies go, in my humble opinion, there isn't much caring going on; I can't get behind the characters on a emotional level, and if they were named Boggie Worrywart, Whiney Moods and Chasity Belt instead of Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker and Padme Amidala I'm sorry to say I probably wouldn't have seen any of the SW prequels until they were available for rent on video. and

And if no one cares who's going to watch/read it?

I think a lot of us here at Fan Fiction has either instictively or logically picked up on it and therefore we come here and 'right the ship' as it were. Some put a lot of energy into it because of this and have success, some just copy the movie model and wonder why loudly in Writer's Resource no one is reading their stories, split or no split of the Boards. Heart could be a factor right up there with grammer/spelling, and truth be told that's the number one reason why folks read stories from storytellers over and over again, or expand on an audience, and sometimes lose an audience because, again, it's like metaphorically reading word for word something bad happening to a dear friend or close relative AFTER you have visually seen it yourself.

Its Human for us to want to stop and watch the preverbral car wreck happening out of morbid curiousity. We do until we discover its someone we know and love; that's when folks really care and compells them to do whatever comes next. There's folks that fear that and just assume not to watch, or read it.

As a storyteller you have to take the path no one goes in order for folks to care; a great risk that either rewards you with the blessing of readership or the failure of posting. I go down that path a lot and I do so with an admitted fear; when one goes down it, can they write themselves out of it? Can I shut it off? No. Can I ignore it? Hell no. Can I write myself in and then write myself out of it? Most definately. If I felt I couldn't this saga would have been over at The Dark Hope Chapter Six.

Djuva's right, she isn't alone in her feelings. Many a Loyal Lurker didn't want to see what happened next and I can't blame them. They all had the same feeling; the characters are so damn real they alone are scary for just existing; to hell with blood and gore and anything else that fills the story: just bare the soul of Juna Rapier and that's enough to chill a real life soul.

My late Grandfather said once "It isn't heroicism unless the event is so great, the hero(es) is so small, and the everyone involved respectively pays/paid a price.". This from a Native American who drove an ambulance during live action and had to confirm the identities, if possible all around, of dead bodies in the European Theather during World War II who I immediately considered a hero to begin with. It was the last part that made no sense to me until I got older, and I see it as a wise piece of information that in some form or another has been said by others or ec

 

Your European Chief? Hah! Let's see who of us gets the money first and then youcan become my US representative

 

Really?

Well, if so....that's okay! I don't mind taking orders from a woman. Just be easy on the whip.....

CREAM! Whipcream on the celebritory cake, when we get the book published, you dirty minded people! I got to watch my figure.

 

If you guys start a publishing company, I'll be your first Canadian customer

 

Okay.....but you must not only pay with money but with Canadien bacon.

We'll have a deal.

----------------------------------------

Well, yours truly is busy working on putting the stories together -- TDH and TFL in respective folders -- and compressing them in .zip for shipping via email; that's the hope, for I do have a 'customer' of sorts.

Right now is TFL, and after copy and pasting the prologues and Act One in the file, this is what I got:

File Size: 2.06 MB
Font: New Times Roman
Size: 12
Style: single space between paragraphs
Total pages at the end of Act One - Gets Me Through (with Prologues attached): 578!

I mean !

 

Tell ya what. I'll send you some Canadian bacon, and a couple of pounds of good old Alberta BEEF!

However, all I ask is that when you make your burgers out of that beef, please eat them while wearing a big sign that says:

CANADA IS MAD COW FREE! BUY OUR MEAT, DAMMIT!

 

On that Mad topic, did you know that Mcdonalds is getting US beef shipped to different locations? I read that in my newspaper today.

 

LOL! DEAL!

UPDATE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

File size: 3.6 MB
Pages by the end of ACT TWO Including Prologues: 1033!

I have to ask: Did I write this?!?!?!?!

 

That's one big book.

 

You did write it indeed. And I believe I must open up more website to accomodate all of this! LOL!

 

Yup, you're all right: I did write it.

The Fading Light Complete as the file is called is now compiled story wise and nearly ready for zipping and distribution for those who want it.

Final stats before further upgrades and zipping:

File Size: 7.32 MB

Number of Pages: 2043 pages!

SCARY, UNPLANNED BUT IT HAPPENED: With the addition of a Title Page, which represents page one and the first prologue begins on Page two, TFL ends with prologues and story (NOT counting the Epilogue) at 2003 pages.

 

Can you send me the file when it's ready? I'd like to read it again without everybody's thread posts.

 

Sure!

 

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Okay, the good news is yes I'm done.

The bad news is the compression worked, but the file weighs in at 2.31 MB. That's down from 7.34 MB, but still....

I'm going to figure it out, unless one of you folks know a way to get it even smaller.

 

[face_shocked] Look at the size of that thing!

That is one impressive amount of quality writing! Not that we do not know it of course, but still this is a good reminder of the fact.

As to how to make the file smaller, well, what about chopping it up into smaller bits, downloadable seperately?

Can I have a file too?

 

Absolutely, D: you asked for it before and that was why I was doing it.

And yup I have to break it down, but there is still a bit of a problem. Nothing big, but I know for a fact that most email accounts have a data limit; as one whole file or even four, it's still accumalitive.

Soooooooooo I will send each of four files at a time, but only doing so once someone responds back to said email and file attachment.

NOTE: these will be in Microsoft Word. Hopefully there won't be a need to change the format, but if so it's gotta be a common one that I can do. Just a warning ahead of time.

 

Ooooh...sign me up for those stories

As a side note, Casper, saving a document file in Rich Text Format (RTF) is more universal than MS Word, so if you're stuck for a common format, that's one way to go.

 

Thanks, Whiskey, I'll keep that in mind.

Okay, some of you have no emails listed in your profiles, so if you could write to my Hot Mail address.

casperknightshade@hotmail.com

Thank you.

 

...and so it is done: the Countdown begins.

Live it!:

The Dark Hope Museum

And now discuss it with me!:

Gessaholics Anonymous

It requires a free sign up to Aimoo.com to post messages, questions, jokes and what not. The site is Ad Free: no annoying popups. Yours truly will attempt to schedule daily Q and A sessions and discussions and revelations, but that doesn't mean you can't leave a message. I will get back to it.

FORWARD!

 

WHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!

The Gessaholics board has arrived!
Well! Definitely have to get meself registered there soon enough.

And wow! 2000-some-odd pages! Ah, only you could pull it off, Casper! You've done us all proud!

Now off to that spiffy new board!

 

Thanks, Rok. I definately see you and Whiskey and now Sara there. Aimoo is sooooo much better than ezboards.

BTW - at the TDH Museum, if no one has gone there yet, is a new and very telling Select Image!