Comfy Shoes

    Comfy shoes are nice, we slip them on and get that familiar feeling, and they fit in all the right places. This week I slipped a comfy pair of shoes back on and it was like returning home again, although the comfy shoes in question were in fact of a big shiny clown sized nature… yes the Last Mask continues where it left of and I have started to craft the final two volumes, returning to the world that is welcoming to one and all.

   While editing the first novel I had no problem reading the tale over and over again, which seems a bit unusual for editing, and indeed was eager to get back on with the rest of the series, as I wanted to read what happened. That last bit may sound strange to you, as I am the writer, but it is true, I am just as eager to find out what unfolds in the story as everyone else hopefully is, and I am really missing a good, crazy read.

    The flow chart I use for the trilogy is nearly complete and I even wrote a rough draft of the very final scene, oh just wait until you read that one. So what I wanted to present here are two extracts from the first novel, which I hope show the world of the Joke and why I like returning to this interesting world.

    The first extract contains the arrival of our most darkest of characters and also contains some of the first writing done on the book, although it undoubtedly went through a bit of a change as it made its way to final edition -

   

    Dark tendrils of mirth crept out of the shadows and wove their way across the green fields towards the big top; the merriment of the show within the circus drawing them towards it like a bright flame.

    He was approaching. His black claws reaching out into this world like a slithering death, exploring this fresh realm that was full of new sensations, but also held many old memories for this ebony clown.

    The Harlequin moved with a grace that was not a part of this world, his dance a thing of sardonic joy and his smile a sneer of pain. His every step brought dead flowers to bloom for the briefest of moments, restoring their life back to vivid colour, before withering them once more to dried dead husks. Death passed in his shadows for he was the master of their dark depths and none would escape his decaying gaze. No mind would be left whole again on this day.

    Beside him crept silence, the pale shattered ghost of the twisted mime called Sile. Her face a distorted work of art that bore no resemblance to the beauty she once wore, a visage now twisted by the cruel humours of the Joke. Wisdom and madness lurked within her mind as her baleful eyes sought out their goal, broken pits of raven dark scanning the land with a hunger for this soul.

    And before this grim pair trotted a dog wearing a big, frilly white collar, a pug whose face also bore the marks of the Joke. A snout made red and an eye circled in blue, highlighting the face of the one called Rex, a compatriot of the dark who knew where the true power was.

    Across the fields they moved, this grotesque trio, leaving a wake of death in their path. The Harlequin knew their goal was now near, as this was the time and the place of which they had told, but the clown still remained out of reach, his face unseen by Sile’s dark eyes.

    The music of the circus continued to draw the shadows near, but for others the missing of the performance would cost them very dear.

    Hopefully the contrast of light humour and dark poetics comes across in this scene with the contrast of a pug dog trotting along in the company of a dark twisted pair, a theme often repeated in the novel. To write the world of the Joke it takes getting your mind in the right place, but with this series it currently seems to be no problem doing that. You worry that maybe you can’t repeat what you have done before, but it feels like they are waiting for me to get back.

    And now we come to our second extract, the point where we are introduced to probably the most memorable double act in our journey through the Joke -

    Bludgeon Lane was not a very noteworthy place within the Joke, not a sight that you would go out of your way to see. It was a fairly quiet lane, due to the fact that only one house remained occupied, and the fact that that house remained occupied was the reason no one else wished to live in this lane any more.

    The house was a lopsided shell of suffering and degradation, a home to the horrors of a twisted pair, the two nastiest, most evil individuals you would ever have the misfortune to meet. And if you did happen to meet them, it would most certainly be to your misfortune.

    Within its dank depths a single tiny candle fought a valiant battle against the darkness, fighting back the shadows that echoed with the cries of terror and pain, as a clown sipped at his tea with pleasure and disdain.

    Flopsy enjoyed a nice cup of peppermint tea at the end of a hard day’s work, and today had indeed been full of hard work, some of which still remained under those dirty nails of his. But now was the time to take a brief pause from the activities of the day, and to put his big feet up for a moment’s break, to enjoy the melody of pain and suffering that crept up from the depths of this place.

    Savouring the pleasure of the tea, while seated in his favourite chair, he let the labours of his love wash away, until he heard that familiar gentle jingling of bells approaching from the dark, making the tails of his cap shake gently, and his big red nose quiver with anticipation.

    The lonely candle shuddered.

    And so we meet our tea loving clown, a scene that I had been waiting to write as the drawing of the double act had been crafted long before this scene, so their expectations of what I was going to do were high and I couldn’t disappoint them now, as they can get violent.

    The shape of the final two parts of the trilogy is shaping up well and the comfy shoes are indeed feeling very comfortable for this epic journey through the Joke, so I would like to now leave you with an exclusive peek at book two, the very first piece of dialogue from said volume.

“Popcorn, Mister Scamboldi?”

Campfires and Stars

    Once more, gentle reader, let me return you to our lovely cave, the place we tell our tales sitting around a roaring fire, the attentive minds of our audience hanging on each word we utter, well except old Rumforl at the back who seems to be snoring.

    Our agent Ugg is busy counting his goats and dreaming of all the things he can do with them, but that is not of concern to us, and we will deny any knowledge of said doings when the authorities turn up. No we, the teller of tales, are in our element, we have a tale and we have an audience for the telling of this here tale, so what could possibly be better.

    Let’s be honest with ourselves, we are not going to get rich from the goats charged once Ugg has taken his large cut, we are not going to have a bevy of fur clad, beauties hanging off our finely crafted arms, and we are not going to see our names carved into the side of the mountain. This is our lot in life, to sit around the fire and tell our tales, but this is the best part of our job, this is the reward for our hard work. We sit there and regale our finely crafted musings, and we watch the reactions of our audience as the tale unfolds, accompanied by the constant bleating of Ugg’s new goats of course.

    Time passes and we now find the cave has gone, Ugg has been banged up, and our audience no longer sit with us and enjoy our tales. We now sit on our own, crafting our work before casting it into the wide world for distant readers to enjoy. Our tale may be gathered up and enjoyed upon the far shores of this planet but we may never see this, we may never know the effect our work has on our audience. But then one day we get a reply, maybe it is a review, maybe it is a bleat… sorry tweet, and on that day we connect with our audience again, taken back to the cave and our lovely fire. We hear what they enjoyed, we are told about their experience with our story and we get our greatest reward, the knowledge that someone has taken the journey through our tale and that they have enjoyed what you have done.

    Reviews and feedback are our reward today, they are our way of knowing that what we spent hours toiling over has achieved a goal, and that someone out there really wants to hear your tales. They are far more valuable than the dreams of riches, beauties, and mountain size names. So if you have read a book let the author know if you enjoyed it, show them that the work, they have probably done in the seclusion of their creative sanctuary, has reached out and affected someone else because that is what we love.

    But this is only half the story because there is another side to this tale, the things we could not see when we were sitting in our caves telling tales, things called stars. What we don’t love are stars that are not of the five varieties, the less than perfect score. And why do we hate them so much?

    They are saying our work was not of tip top quality, implying it was lacking in the audiences response, but they are also of an annoying ambiguity. Someone pops along and slaps a four star rating on your work and then happily skip away without a word, leaving said writer pondering the score. You sit there and you think why has my finely crafted tale only achieved a four, what was lacking to make it drop a star? And god forbid someone gives it a single star without comment, is this just someone who hates you, why are they so against what you have done?

    If we get a five star we know someone has enjoyed the work, and a response of said enjoyment is always appreciated by us, but if we get a lower mark then surely we should have at least some comment upon how our work was not enjoyed to its tippy top level. They do not inform us of how we can improve and at the end of the day that is what we aim to do.

    So, gentle reader, please remember in this time of global expansion it is rare for a teller of tale to connect with their audience, feedback that our tales connect is our gold and empty comments our bane. So be careful with your stars, and be kind with your comments.

    And if all this talk of the cave is baffling you then please check out the Blog from days past.

 http://stephenwinterflood.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/goat-trading-for-fun-and-profit.html

A Grin Development

   Today marks exactly two years since I had an idea, so I thought for today’s blog I would share a grin development, or how my game Grindle got to where it is now from that day.

A Simple Idea – Grindle Prototype

   I came up with the original idea for Grindle on the 7th March 2010, after my friend discussed with me about doing a game together for mobiles and if I had any ideas. 

   At that point I didn’t have a clue, but when I went to bed my strange mind got to work and when I awoke the next day I had Grindle in my head, a game where you are shown a row of four grins of different colours and then after are asked to pick a certain colour. A simple idea that I felt would be easy for my friend to program but would also make for an interesting game. So that next morning I set about doing some rough graphics and even knocked up a basic version of the normal game in Game Maker to show him what I had come up with. There were also three additional modes – Time Attack, Full House, and Grindle Mode.

   So with the Prototype complete my friend set about doing a version for Android. A number of months passed and progress was slow, with eventually the project seeming to die, but I wasn’t willing to let it end there and as I am one never to look at something and say I can’t do that, I decided to do a version of my game myself.

A Foolish Plan - Grindle Extreme

   Returning to Game Maker I set about implementing the other three modes. I had no experience with programming so this was very much a learning process, trying to work out how to make random grids, having countdown clocks and various game play ideas that I hadn’t a clue how to do. 

   At this point I came up with the design having a tribal tattoo feel to it, which would hopefully appeal to the a modern Alternative market. 

   After a few months of hair pulling work I eventually had it done and in November of 2010 released Grindle Extreme on the Game Maker site. It got a few good comments and made me realise a number of things that needed adding, but it was an achievement for me to have got the game complete and working to how my initial design had laid out.

   The game then sat there twiddling its fingers until in 2011 when I decided to submit it to the publishers of Game Maker, as they also published some of the games made with GM. The creator of Game Maker replied to me a couple of months later and said he felt that the game was interesting and well executed, but he didn’t think there was enough in it. I asked him if I gave it an update would he be willing to have another look and he said he would.

The Final Fantasy - Grindle Oni   

   With the goal of adding more I then spent two months making the next version of Grindle, which I called Oni. The Alternative tribal look was refined, the graphics were all redrawn for a potential HD product and a lot was added. The game now had an additional nine game modes including a follow the light pattern game, a variation on Find the Lady, and a twist on the picture puzzle games. 

   I learnt a lot during this time about programming and it was even trickier doing it as I had to add the new elements while also building them around the existing ones. But two months later I had Grindle Oni finished, it had 120 Challenges, a tweak system to alter the game, and two new tunes to go with the original, yes I did the music also.

   So there is stood Grindle Oni, and again I felt I had achieved a lot with this. Looking back on the original what once looked good now looked very crude in comparison. And then I submitted it back to the publisher. 

   A while later I got the response, an extensive list of feedback on my game and apart from some cosmetic elements that could be improved the overall comment was there was too much. Yes the game now had too much content, is it possible for a game to have too much?

   In typical Winterflood fashion I had made the game too much. 

   Later he put me on to another company who was now handling the publishing of their games; the man there looked at the Grindle Extreme version by mistake and said he was interested but when I showed him the Oni version they pondered it for a couple of months.

   In the end they felt it didn’t fit their idea of the mobile market today, so I had manage to produce a game that matched my books and art, something distinctly me but without a possible market. With this apparently final nail in its being published I then decided this month to share the game with the rest of the world, it would just be sitting on my computer doing nothing otherwise, and I still think people will enjoy it.

   I hope you enjoyed this little recap of the games journey from quick idea to final product, I don’t know if there may be still some development in it but it is there for people to play and hopefully have fun with. So please now raise a glass and wish Grindle a happy birthday and if it had a cake it would no doubt have a Grin on it :)

   Link to Grindle Oni - http://sandbox.yoyogames.com/games/195237-grindle-oni

The Last Mask Covers Uncovered

Ladies and gentlemen, today for delectation and disdain I present the three covers for the mighty epic they call The Last Mask Trilogy -

- Book 1 -

The opening act, with the Harlequin setting the 

performance off to a fine start.

- Book 2 -

A bit of a puzzle develops in book 2 as the question of 

identity takes center stage, a puzzle indeed.

- Book 3 -

The end of the trilogy. As the show develops we deal with power, 

and it looks like someone is about to crack up.

Goat Trading For Fun and Profit

   When you have finished your latest masterpiece ask yourself a question. Who are the most important people to you and that work?

   So you are sitting in the cave, and you have your new tale finished, ready to share. You’ve given you loincloth a fresh wash in the local stream and stoked the fire ready for the show, and now you wait. But while you are waiting you sit and think about this tale and how it will be received. How do you tell if it is a good one? How do you know if your tales will please?

   You look across at the entrance to the cave, and there sits Ugg, a big, ugly brute… your agent. He is charging two goats for entry tonight, but that is all right as you do get eighty percent of all goats received. After every tale he will inform you of the total goats taken, and praise you for a fine tale based on this number, but is that something you can judge your tale by. Ugg is after all only interested in the goats, although the tribal council could never prove some of the more salacious rumours. So as long as he can see your work as being goatworthy, then he will praise it. But this doesn’t tell you how good your tales are, how much people really enjoy them.

   Ugg can only see goats when he takes you on, he is always mindful of his success percentage, he doesn’t really care what your story is about just as long as the people turn up every night to hear the new one. When he tells you it is wonderful he will always have those commercial thoughts in the front of his mind, and how you will affect his reputation in the world of tale telling, because frankly it is the only world he has a reputation left in.

   The person that is of most value, other than that little voice in your head that likes to pop up at the most annoying times, is the one who turns up, sits through your tale, and is willing to hand over a couple of goats to do so. The audience, the reader, the patron of your art is more important than all the Uggs of this world. The audience do not have a commercial interest in your tale. They are not making money from your work, but want to give you the time to tell your story. So when someone sits through your latest masterpiece, their feedback is worth more than any goat trader.

   When someone reads your story, or watches your performance, and then tells you what they think, it should be an unbiased opinion. It should be comments that are not based on commercial values of how you can be exploited. Apart from the occasional tribe member that you may have upset during the weekly cave painting, and whose opinion might have ulterior motives, this feedback should be valued and appreciated above the likes of Ugg’s every day.

   If you want to improve your tales then listen to the people that have given it the time, without financial interest. If you want to be a goat mogul then go find Ugg, there is sure to be a cave nearby with one of his sort inside.

   And finally please remember that if the audience don’t like the tale, there are no refunds, as Ugg does not return goats.

I Hate Flashbacks

   I have a cunning plan. I really need to get book two of The Last Mask done, but I am short of ideas and time. The book is about one of the characters searching through their memories so I came up with the plan of cutting massive chunks of the first novel and putting them into the second, and then just writing little bits to join together these memory flashbacks. Sounds fair enough, right? It means I can churn out the book in a week, and it is cheap, so that has to be a good thing? The readers won’t mind, will you?

   Don’t be silly. That is a complete cheat to the customer. So why do series like Star Trek and Stargate think it was a valid excuse for putting together an episode when they had run out of ideas and money.

   Just to make it clear - I hate Flashback episodes.

   I just watched “Shades of Grey” the climatic episode of Star Trek the Next Generation series two and it was a flashback episode. Yes the climatic episode of the series was a boring flashback… really? Anyway, this episode dealt with Riker getting an infection, which is only surprising for the fact that with the amount he puts himself about it has taken two whole series for him to get an infection. We are then subjected to a mass of flashbacks from the previous two series. These type of episodes are surely only enjoyable to your pet goldfish with their limited memory.

   If I did what they did with my book then I am sure readers would hate me and probably never buy anything of mine again, but I can’t see why it is an acceptable tool for TV series. Can’t anyone come up with a more creative way of having flashbacks? Can’t they shoot some new, relevant scenes?

   And while talking about flashbacks, Spartacus had a really idiotic one this week also.

   ** Spoiler Warning **

   If you watch Spartacus and haven’t watched this week’s episode skip the next paragraph…

   One character this week believed the love of his life was dead and so was remembering her, cue flashback. The only problem was the flashback had a new actress in the role, so only the dumb would not realise that this meant she wasn’t dead, otherwise why not just use old footage. Okay we knew it was probably a lie that she was dead, but try and be a bit more intelligent TV people, or should I say at least treat us like you think we are intelligent.

   ** End of Spoiler Warning **

   So there you have it, I hate flashback episodes because they are cheap and wasting my time. If I want to see a fondly remembered episode I can go back and watch it on DVD. And rest assured, I won’t be pasting big chunks of the first book of The Last Mask into book two, I think I can be a bit more creative than that.

 Till next time, make it so...

A Romantic Comedy

A romantic comedy would probably sum up those rare occasions when I have had someone to possibly enjoy Valentine’s Day with, the emphasis being on ‘possibly’. So I therefore tend to avoid the day and even at one time, when I worked in a shop, booked the day off so I didn’t have to witness the event.

So as this day draws around again my thoughts were drawn to my novel, The Last Mask, and all the love that is in it, and you thought it was all darkness and death didn’t you?

The novel starts off with a bit of unrequited love, adds a bit of brotherly love, and sprinkles the love of family and friends in for good measure, all in the opening act. The rest of the novel goes on to cover such variations as doomed lovers, the love of two clowns for each other, which we will quickly pass over, and a bit of self-love from one particular ego maniac. So much love in all its forms that maybe I should have pitched it as a romance novel, or not…

And there you have it; a novel that at first appears to be filled with a lot to fear actually has a lot of love to give, if you look in the right place. But then again some might say that love is something people fear, so maybe the book is all about fear after all.

I hope those that have a good Valentine’s Day to look forward to enjoy it, and to those who don’t I hope you manage to avoid its horrors. And I leave you with the opening of Act 4 of The Last Mask, a chapter appropriately called - A Romantic Comedy.

Love is but a chain we tie around ourselves, a prison for our souls. So easy to fall into the pit of its embrace, but so hard to climb back out of its oblivion, we believe we are free, free to choose, and free to believe what we see, but that is a lie. Fate’s hand will play us with its tune, and love’s chains will imprison us like a fool, we are but the stuff of life, and it will take us where it will. Returning to a love once lost is a place that no mortal should go, a place full of memories that can never be again, and full of hope that will forever be lost, for within this place lurks a shadow, full of hate and regret. So now a romantic comedy, of dark proportions, awaits our fools on this quest.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Last-Mask-Book-Tradition-ebook/dp/B006NWQYVI/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1324298916&sr=8-3

http://www.amazon.com/Last-Mask-Book-Tradition-ebook/dp/B006NWQYVI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325936055&sr=8-1