The Mandate of Heaven

I don't have any stories along those lines, but that is still very cool.

the only thing I have to add is that I'm jealous of your wordcount production.

Zoombie, that's excellent! Sounds like synchronicity to me.

Three years ago, I went to the beach with four other couples for a week. We shared a very large house. While there, I planned on doing some writing on a new story I was just starting, if things got boring.

The reality, at night, we partied, but during the day, I wrote in the house while my friends lounged on the beach, sweating and getting sun poisoning. I wrote about fifteen chapters, or 30,000 words. (Very rough draft). The theme of the book was about pirates and the beach atmosphere really inspired me. Everything just flowed naturally for me while there, no hangups or pauses to figure this or that out. It took three months when I got home to finish the book working on it part time. It is still waiting for revisions and editing...

My mandate of heaven was the swine flu. Man was I sick. It locked me in bed for a week. But I wrote 50k words during that week and the following. My first "real" novel. I had to edit the crap out of it afterwards, but its fundamentals were okay.

That's pretty cool, Zoomb.

Zoombie said:

So, I was thinking of writing a story. I had a few half formed ideas in my brain. Then onto my MSN list comes a feller I haven't talked to for YEARS. Literally, YEARS. We shoot the breeze a bit. And I shoot him my idea of a near future YA set in earth's orbit, detailing a war between factions.

And he goes, "Oh, that sounds neat. Did I mention I'm an expert on orbital dynamics and space warfare? Here is 20 pages of tailor made advice."

And suddenly vague idea turns into 17,000 words written in 4 days

When this happens to a book, I say that it's clearly a sign that the book is part of the Mandate of Heaven. Yes, I am a Chinese history nut, why do you ask?

Anywho, have you ever had this happen? If so, share stories about it!

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I'm glad to hear your WIP is going well, but the coolest part of this post for me is that it's possible, in this day and age, to be an expert on space warfare.

Yes, I am a geek like that.

I wrote my first novel (65k wds) in 5 weeks. It's about a boy prostitute who hits the proverbial jackpot. Here is a small sample. This scene takes place in a French monastery.
“Thank you, Mon Père—for this [counsel] and for your friendship.”
J-- knelt on the rough stone floor. As he received the absolution of the faithful, he prayed his contrition, “…and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven, and the pains of hell.”
After embracing the monk in farewell, J-- walked back to the chateau.

Heavenly? Umm, perhaps.
C

Mr. Anonymous said:

the only thing I have to add is that I'm jealous of your wordcount production.

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Second that.

I guess right now would be my MoH, but even so I seem to be spending more time cruising Amazon looking for sci-fantasy books - why can't they just be marked "sci-fantasy" instead of strictly "sci-fi" or "fantasy." Bleh!

SusanL said:

Sounds like synchronicity to me.

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Either that, or just a funny coincidence. The former overthrows all of modern biology (product of millions of hours of systematic human inquiry), while the latter leaves it intact.

Is some anecdotal evidence worth it, considering that there are billions of people, each encountering many situations a day in which coincidences could occur, but actually do not?

Great story by the way!

Zoombie said:

So, I was thinking of writing a story. I had a few half formed ideas in my brain. Then onto my MSN list comes a feller I haven't talked to for YEARS. Literally, YEARS. We shoot the breeze a bit. And I shoot him my idea of a near future YA set in earth's orbit, detailing a war between factions.

And he goes, "Oh, that sounds neat. Did I mention I'm an expert on orbital dynamics and space warfare? Here is 20 pages of tailor made advice."

And suddenly vague idea turns into 17,000 words written in 4 days

When this happens to a book, I say that it's clearly a sign that the book is part of the Mandate of Heaven. Yes, I am a Chinese history nut, why do you ask?

Anywho, have you ever had this happen? If so, share stories about it!

Click to expand...

I love when stuff like that happens to me. It doesn't happen on quite such a grand scale but it does.

Yesterday, my mother called and we talked for quite a while (as we are wont to do) and she started talking about The Book of Job in the Bible. Discussion went around and around until she said something that took a vague idea I had for a book but could make nothing come of it and made it all click into place. It was an 'ahHA OMG WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THAT BEFORE' moment and all writing on current project was set aside for the day so I could get my tumbling ideas of how it would all actually work down on paper.

Zoombie said:

Step 1: http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3t.html

Step 2: Read everything else on that webpage.

Oh yeah, and it's just a nice happenstance. I'm just using the Mandate of Heaven because it's helping me study for my History of Early China midterm tomorrow.

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Multitasking is so much easier when one of the tasks is studying really cool history, no?