Battle for Lurandor - (chasm of time series)

7/1/2018 - Battle for Lurandor

This post is in preparation for removing the rest of the posts dealing with 'The Chasm of Time Series' except for Little Ann, Discovery, and The 5th Agent. The complete series takes place in two different times, the ancient 'long ago and far away' and the present day in and around Durango, CO. These three stories are what comprises the modern day part.

As for the ancient part there are several pieces to consider. First is Landfall which was the ancient portion of 'Landfall & Discovery'. The next piece, Colony, had remained unfinished for nearly three years while I searched for a suitable ending. Then I wrote 'Under the Double Suns" to be the prequel to Landfall which would then be followed by 'Colony'.;  The project seemed incomplete even though 'BTDS' was complete by itself. But, I knew I could do more; so I did.

So, I came up with a plan and wrote a prequel to the prequel and then a sequel to it all. Here is what it looks like now even though it is in pieces.

Part 1: Argon Specador
Part:2 Beneath the Double Suns
Part 3: Landfall
Part 4: Colony
Part 5: Aftermath

But the parts were unbalanced, some pieces way bigger than others. If you're going to break it into pieces it's best to have them roughly equivalent in size. With this in mind I went from 5 parts to 7. It's not cast in solid steel yet, but part 7 is just a maybe.


Part 1: Argon Specador     This is written and is the prequel to 'Beneath the Double Suns'. This part is all about the main character and how he became who he is in the second part.

Part 2: Agent Pylie Ruilidor     This is about the first two thirds of BTDS starting with the introduction of Agent Pylie Ruilidor. This is a change of POV as we've changed main characters.

Part 3: Commandant Karmador     I haven't settled on the main character at this point as this part is still in developement.

Part 4: The For Lorne     This contains all of Landfall, a whole cast of new characters alluded to in the previous part.

Part 5: Colony     This was, and still is the shortest piece and still under developement; it may end up annexed to Part 4.

Part 6: Death of an empire     This part happens many years after Part 3. As with anything dealing with history what you learn depends on who is telling the story and their reasons for doing so.

Part 7: The Evergreen Movement     Not even sure if I remember why I put this one here.

I haven't checked word counts lately but the total is coming close to 80K.


previous comments


5/27/2018
I have spent some time on this project including an attempt at the fractured approach. If you're not familiar with this process it works like the name of the process says, essentially divide and conquer. First you take and divide the body of the project into relevant sections.

Next test each section for size, content and completeness. Sections, by nature, should be of similar size and content. Once you've fleshed out each of the sections to the authors (me in this case) satisfaction they can be recombined into one homogeneous whole once again.

At this point I usually reconsider the title, size, and if I'm satisfied that the story is complete. It should also be noted here that I'm not a strict follower of certain rules such as POV and length of story. I've seen many authors change POV on the fly as it allows a more fuller understanding of the plot as seen from more that one set of eyes. When I write a story, it will simply be as long as I deem necessary to tell the story.

 1/31/2018
Not much has been happening with this project as I have had more important things on my mind. I now have a file on my desktop that helps me keep on top of the several projects in the works. I have integrated all the parts, new beginning, existing parts from "Beneath the Double Suns", "Colony", and the associated parts from the original "For Lorne" (which became Landfall). I have listed out the projected path for the Chasm of Time stories (not the books) in a previous post and those plans haven't changed.


28 Dec 2017

Unfortunately this unfinished project has been gathering dust. However, that doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about it. By George I think it may be cursed! After all, parts of it formed a project that I never seemed able to finish (Colony). That project was a natural extension from the short pieces from my first story (For Lorne). They were included as a back story to explain why that found what they did in the mine and how they got there to begin with. I eventually wrote (Under the Double Suns) as a prequel to (For Lorne). At this point I've completed the consolidation of all three separate pieces along with several new parts to glue it all together. The first half begins with a young Carson Karmador and chronicles his adventures up to his sudden death leaving his young aid Pylie Ruilidor in command. As commandant Ruilidor begins to sort out the various parties involved he finds a very tangled web of intrigue and deceit. The book ends many years later as Professor Ruilidor discovers another resurgence of the empire. This is the part I haven't, as yet, finished. The part I have yet to create.


18 Oct 2017
You may not have noticed that I've changed this to Book One. That would also mean that "Discovery" without "Landfall" would become Book Two and "Eagls's Flight" (formerly "The Fifth Agent") would become Book Three. Or maybe something like this...
Across the Chasm of Time: Battle for Lurandor
Across the Chasm of Time: Out of the Depths of Time
Across the Chasm of Time: The Fifth Agent

At this point I have split the manuscript into several smaller files to see if that will make it easier to work on.

Part One: The early life of Carson Karmador. His real and assumed names and how he ended up as Major Karmador of the Lurandor Security Service.
Part Two: All of the first part of "Beneath the Duble Suns" up to the point where Commander Ruilidor takes over and just before the death of Commandant Karmador.
Part Three: All about the For Lorne up to the point where the ships leave the planet.
Part Four: All of "Colony" with a lot of additions to finish out the sequence.
Part Five: Picks up where Part two leaves off leading up to the death of Commandant Karmador and the supsequent events.
Part Six: is sort of an epilogue and it is titled "The Death of an Empire" It sorts through all of the various plots before showing Pylie Ruilidor now as professor Emeritus of the Academy. He is being interviewed by a rash young man who wants to write a book about the forgotten heroes of Lurandor; the ones from Harembeau! It is the professors solemn duty to reveal to him what really happened back then as the walls of the empire were shattered by the events during his time as Commandant of the LSS. This I think will be better than what I originally wrote (see 9/18/2017) below.

Several parts are fully completed but there are still some threads that need to be smoothed out. The hardest part has been keeping everything in a logical and chronological order; not always an easy task. I was hoping by breaking it into these parts I would be able to keep things straight.

I was once told that "If you want to switch people's point of view, the story needs to be told from an omniscent narrator." I believe he was trying to tell me I kept changing viewpoints. Real life has many viewpoints all around us. I'm writing a large story arc which covers more than just one person's viewpoint. Reason is simple, many things in this story happen long after one person's death. also, the story line itself is being told from several viewpoints to give it more life and reality. Old Blue Eyes said it best ...I did it my way...


9/18/2017
Work progresses but slowly. I've just scrapped most of the last section and took a change of course and hope to reach the same ending by a different means. It wasn't the story of it, but the believability of it that made me change my mind. It was getting to complicated when I wanted simple. I wanted an impact similar to the ending of 'Planet of the Apes'.

The beginning section is complete and most of the next two sections are fully edited and leads up to the For Lorne section. I'm trying something new with this project, breaking it into several sections to get a better handle on size and keeping the relevant parts together. I hope this helps find any duplicate parts as well. I made this comment several months ago.

          "It will feel like an epic when its finished although not quite that in length. I'm also forming it into four or five parts which will also take some time; it is like a Frankenstein's monster at present and needs to be cultivated into a Mona Lisa."


6/27/2017
The writing is nearly completed and the project is in the final stages of editing. I didn't quite reach my goal of over 70K words but I came close. There are two main characters that comprise the main portion of the storyline.

4/2/2017
I've written quite a bit about the early life of Carson Karmador, one of the main characters, and its been an interesting write discovering how he came to be where he is. Pylie Ruilidor, the other main character, will get added to at the other end of the book. There are some other twists and unexpected turns coming for the rest of the story as well; and hopefully to finish of the Colony thread as well. I have some interesting thoughts on what is going to happen to them as well. You'll have to read the book to find out the biggest twist of all and how it ties back with the rest of the Chasm of Time books.

3/24/2017
This is a new title for the merged contents of "Beneath the Double Suns", "Landfall", and "Colony"; all part of my master plan for the Chasm of Time Series.

The merger is complete but left several threads open. First is a logical conclusion to the Colony part which in turn wraps back around into the end of Double Suns. Plans are to flesh out the younger life of Carson Karmador before he became part of the Lurandor Security Service along with closing the whole shebang out with a closing segment featuring Commandant Ruilidor as he pieces all of the threads together and faces, head on, the last vestiges of the Harembeau on Lurandor. It will feel like an epic when its finished although not quite that in length. I'm also forming it into four or five parts which will also take some time; it is like a Frankenstein's monster at present and needs to be cultivated into a Mona Lisa.

The Other Side of the Mirror (horror)

The Other Side of the Mirror

5-15-2018
Submitted to critters.org for critique, takes 3-4 weeks in the queue before being seen by the members. Received about 11 critiques ranging from good to bad but still gleaned some good comments overall. The biggest challenge, other then the English language, was keeping it within the boundary of less than 5,000 words; some places prefer less than 3,000 but sometimes the story wants to be the size it is. Who am I to tell the story it can't be what it wants to be?

11-15-2017
 Re-edited again. Tried smoothing out and decided to try once more. Submitted to another publisher but they won't begin looking and the submissions until 1-31-2018, and that's today.

10-28-2017
I have removed all of the previous entries to this blog entry as they no longer portray the finished storyline. It the year since I first conceived it, the story has decided what it wants to be, even though I, at first, resisted even the thought of writing it. At one point about a year ago I posed the plot to a mental health provider (not for me, for someone else) and she said the story would give her nightmares. I know what part of my mind conjured it but that's not why I finally decided to do it. I convinced myself it was an opportunity to try my hand at horror. Sadly it has been rejected twice but I've kept submitting and I have the hopes it will eventually be accepted.

Across the Chasm of Time Sereies (Chasm of Time Series)

12 Feb2017 -My plans for this arc of story line have changed over time. This was my first endeavor into writing science fiction and I have never been content that it was finished. The post below shows all of the pieces. The original project contained both part 5 with pieces of part 2 scattered throughout the first half. I had so much fun doing that one that I immediately wrote the sequel (part 6) calling it "The Fifth Agent", a title picked by my grand daughter Olivia. I now had two good stories and some left over pieces that just didn't seem to fit, some from the ships landfall and some from Ann's past; I decided to see where those would go.

I took the pieces of Ann's younger self and created a separate story called "Little Ann". That story remains separate and stands on it own. The pieces from the aftermath of the ships landfall dealt more with the colonists left behind. I worked with those for some time but just didn't have the inspiration to do it justice so I shelved it for a time.

After doing several other projects I came up with the idea of where the whole story started and see what I could do with that. "Beneath the Double Suns" was the result but I still felt it wasn't complete.
Back to the inspirational drawing board, I went off and wrote a few short stories, some completed others not. During this period I delved into light fantasy on the one hand and dark psychological on the other. I even tried a few with weird twists.

The original stories "For Lorne" and "The 5th Agent" have been released in paperback and ebook as "Landfall & Discovery" and "Eagle's Flight". The far past parts had been separated from the present day story line and become parts 2 and 5; while Eagles Flight was just a name change.Then I had an inspiration.

After over thirty stories, some published, others not, I had the great thought: why not combine parts 1, 2, and 3, into one large story and make this a trilogy? Little Ann would stay as is, but combining the three parts turns out to be a great idea. Well, at least for now it does, I haven't finished it yet as there are several issues with the timing of events and how to make the ending work. I'm not worried yet, I've still lots of imagination to call on.


Across the Chasm of Time                                                                                                                   
Part 1: Beneath the Double Suns                           Part One:   Beneath the Double Suns/
Part 2: Landfall                                                                         Empire under the Suns
Part 3: Colony                                                        Part Two:   Discovery
Part 4: Little Ann                                                    Part three: The Fifth Agent
Part 5: Discovery
Part 6: Eagles Flight                                              Companion Novel: Little Ann

As you can see I haven't quite settled on a title for part one yet. As I've already used the "Across the Chasm of Time" title the trilogy would probably be called "Beyond the Chasm of Time" or "Out of the Depths of Time"; something along those lines.


All previous posting has been deleted. This thread continues in the "Battle for Lurandor" post!

I Am Victor Rogers (short story)

12/26/2017 (The Reconstructed Man)
Revised somewhat to reach a word count goal and submitted to a publisher looking for stories of this size and subject. To make things easier I renamed it "The Reconstructed Man". Expected reply is 2/20/2018.

6/17/2016 - Yes, this is only a short story, and it has some other unique qualities as well. I could also list several things it doesn't have but that's sort of a negative logic to guess what it does have. Needless to say you'll have to read it to find out.

NOTE: There were well over 30 hits on this story the day I published it on smashwords. Later on I may include it in an collection of short stories.

My Grandfather's Spaceship [Companion to the Cornish Talisman series]

12/28/2017 - Years end cleanup; deleted all but last post.

 Although I've considered this completed and only in need of one last edit, I'm still thinking it might need just a little more excitement. Maybe adding a few more cliff hangers so to speak; and that's for all you oldsters that remember movie serials where each weekly installment ended with a cliff hanger. That is a situation that puts either or both the hero and or his associates in peril.

6/27/2017 - My Grandfather's Spaceship
In all "My Grandfather's Spaceship" is a delightful tale starting off with piracy, a kidnapping, saving a damsel in distress, and riding off into the sunset after playing games with two F-15 jets. And that's just the beginning.

A Light in the Window

2/2/2017 - As a novella I'm considering adding this to a few others and publishing it that way. I've added rear legs to the table and it looks much better. No you will not find a picture of this anywhere else as it is my little monster, stitched together from several pieces of a much larger and more ornate piece of furniture.

6/17/2016 - I have finished the writing of this project and been through two edits. I still have some concerns about the dates I'm using in the beginning that don't match the documented dates later on.
As usual with some of these projects the plot defies what my original concept had planned for. I eventually gave in and valiantly continued writing. Result is now Novella sized and the ending has totally changed from what I had planned. That doesn't mean it's a bad ending though, I don't write bad endings; at least not that I'm aware off... My thanks go out to my son-in-law for parts of the European history that are alluded to but I did my own research on watch and music box makers.

5/20/2016 -First update since inception!
While working on other projects I am considering how to smooth out the wrinkles in this one. The first chapter, and the several others already written have become the lynch pins upon which I will finish this story. Even though the first chapter alludes to certain things they will eventually be proven to be misconceptions; if I told you more specifics that would ruin the story. As a short story I may or may not put together a cover image. More later on as to progress.

4/15/2016

My bad! I put this post in place several weeks ago and never wrote a word in it.
This story was originally supposed to be dark and mysterious. So much for that. It has turned itself into more of a forbidden romance between the poor young inventor and the daughter of a rich man who has other plans for his young lady. Plans wrapped around money and power. Like many stories I've written the beginnings to, this one didn't want to go the way I wanted it do and I ended up with a tangled mess for a plot. So I threw in another character (or two) and changed direction. Yes, the beginning is dark and brooding and it makes you wonder just what the old man has in the bag and its history. I know who made it and what its history is, but its purpose may be more complicated than I originally anticipated. No, it won't be a long story, and for now I guess, the ending is not as bleak. I just haven't figured out who gets the girl in the end. Oh well.

Beneath the Stars Above (available at amazon.com)

BENEATH THE STARS ABOVE
(genre: light fantasy)

Is now available through amazon.com, just visit: [ https://www.amazon.com/Beneath-Stars-Above-M-L-Humphrey/dp/1548970042/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1505773753&sr=1-1&keywords=beneath+the+stars+above ]

Working on the final edit of the formatted text from the publisher; this is my last chance to make sure all is OK. I have picked the cover from 3 that the publisher choose for my consideration.

This story is about the life of Parker Morley and his dream of becoming a journalist. Toward that end he has to overcome his fathers objections, Henry Morley wanted his son to follow in his foot steps and become an engineer but Parker's mind was made up; he wanted to go to Bendix University to study journalism. No, it wasn't at all easy to do. First he had to pass the board of admissions and Eddie Thornton. But that was just the beginning.