Sharks Never Die

You may have just read The Sharks of Old London. (<-- this will be a link to the flash fiction of said name, but it hasn't been posted yet. If there is no link, there will be later, when I remember.)

The Sharks of Old London is a post-apocalypse type tale set in the same universe as Love Like a Shark. Love Like a Shark was the first thing I ever submitted to the #fridayflash collector (over a year ago). The Sharks of Old London is only tangentially connected however, the characters come from the same program, but the two stories focus on different characters in different time periods.

One of the key plot elements is one that has never left me. Sharks never die. How true this is I'm not sure. The theory is that the mechanism in humans which prevents cells from multiplying uncontrollably and thus decreases the chance of cancers while at the same time limiting the regeneration, healing, longevity of our bodies is not there in sharks. They can heal and regenerate cells indefinitely and they are mostly protected from solar radiation (by miles of water) so the chances of cancers are less. (to describe the whole thing in a grossly simplified way)

People (me included) are fascinated with this idea, in the same way that we are fascinated with almost anything that could heal us and make us live forever. And yet the only way this can work is if we somehow suppress the mutating of the cells, ensuring cancer does not become a massive problem.

The metaphor here, of course, is that this story will not die in my head, but it does mutate and break the surface from time to time. For example when the Shark Knight prompt appeared, which is when I wrote The Sharks of Old London.

#fridayflash highlights debut entries. So Love Like a Shark is still one of my most viewed stories. In some ways I think this was not my greatest move, it was relatively experimental, focussing on dialogue so much it was published in script form, completely unlike my usual writing. I wonder if that didn't put a few people off reading more of my work. Oh well.

So the story has re-emerged.

One of the things I'm working on at the moment is expanding some of the flash fictions I posted when I started this blog into short stories for my first anthology (hopefully out this June).

Often with flash fiction, my own and others, people ask for more. This can turn into a serial, a short story, or go nowhere. When I first wrote The Sharks of Old London, the early line about the dangers of London at night mentioned the Ripper, and at the end the Knight mentioned that there were two of his kind left in the world. I changed this for poignancy (hopefully) and brevity. I was cutting the word count close and I didn't feel the mention of the Ripper was necessary to this particular tale.

However, when I come to expand this story for the Small Change anthology (in three years time...) it will have the Ripper reinstated. It will be the story of a London terrorised by a post-apocalyptic Jack the Ripper, born of sharks, and of his brother determined to take him down as the last act of a cursed program to make immortal protectors.

I hope it comes out as awesome as that sounds in my head... ^_~

Equals and Sequels

I started writing a third flash this morning featuring the Sora Tanaka and Sergeant Browning characters. The first (This Pit) was posted to Missing Pieces last November, the second will appear soon, and I have a fourth in mind...

The difficulty is that although they feature the same characters they are not a serialised story. Even though this morning's (and the fourth) are direct sequels to the second. I mean I want them to stand alone as well as being sequels. Someone should be able to come to them fresh, but someone who has met the characters before should also enjoy reading more on them.

This presents a difficulty. I need to re-introduce the main characters (three, about the maximum you want in flash fiction), and I need to do it in a way that will still be interesting for people who have met them before. It needs to be both a reminder and a standalone.

Added to this is that it plays with both surreality and humour. The surreal I'm comfortable with, humour is a little out of my comfort zone (a good thing, of course, it's always good to push yourself).

And then there's the concept, which again, is established in the first part, but needs to be re-established quickly in this part too.

Oh yeah, and then I've actually got to fit the story in on top of that, all in under a thousand words... *phew*

I'm pleased with the way the first draft is shaping up, but I'm going to have to work hardest at the humour part, as I thought I might...

I'm also trying to put out of my mind a piece I was 'commissioned' to write (not for money...). Because I've written it, it's good (it actually might just be one of my best), but the turnaround on it is only a couple of weeks... So my normal editing cycle is to leave it for at least a month, usually more, and then come back to it... now I've got a few days to step away and then come back and edit it for next week... I'm just glad the first draft turned out so well...