Last night I unequivocally tied Prodigies with Whose Hearts are Mountains through a background character we only know about through his daughter's eyes -- Durant Smith aka Arthur Schmidt aka Weissrogue. I didn't put much about him in Whose Hearts are Mountains, but I wrote a considerable backstory about how one becomes the government's key cryptographer. (The story involves a 15-year-old Weissrogue taking out the weapons systems of the major powers, and the US and Russia realize he's too talented to kill.) Weissrogue, whose talents went to the US, may have begun Renaissance Theory through Russia's envy. The thing is, Weissrogue/Arthur Schmidt has been monitoring Renaissance Theory's Dark Web presence because his name came up there once. He doesn't believe he's a Prodigy.
I want to be careful with mixing the "worlds". I don't want to write "Justice League meets the Avengers meets the Guardians meets the X-Men meets the Fantastic Four to obliterate a dairy cow."
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| On second thought ... |
I want to keep my characters mostly in their communities -- the Archetypes with the few humans they've adopted; the Travellers (not Romani, but a slightly affected bunch of hereditary time travelers), and the genetically blessed Prodigies, not to forget the Tree-given gifts of the collective Barn Swallows' Dance. The key is, all of these groups are so afraid of discovery that they tend to stay insular. If they meet, they generally keep it a secret, as Arthur keeps his Prodigy abilities quiet to his family, while ironically, his daughter is a half-human Nephilim.
On a related tiny universe note --
What is the effect on Earth that these small bands of preternatural humans exist? Is there such a thing as too many heroes? In a real sense, my characters do not have superhero strength, nor did I intend them to. Many of the problems we face are more than we can handle, but someone who can lift a jetliner like Superman can't scale down to break up a bar fight or rescue a kitten from a tree.
My question is: can't heroes be humans complicated by their born or given talents? The DC universe doesn't do a bad job of it, except for the part where they destroy entire city blocks and nobody really cares. You only get to destroy entire city blocks, endangering thousands of humans, when you're a superhero. You only can afford a lack of introspection about who you are when you're a superhero.
In other words, I am a little worried about how convoluted my -- world? universe? -- is. But then I see Greg (from Prodigies) butt heads with someone in a coffee shop, and I suddenly realize it's Arthur, and he's been set to spy on them until he feels a pull from that place in his heart he calls his conscience, and I run with it.
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I should give you some updates:
1) My Kindle Scout campaign for Gaia's Hands is dead, and cannot be turned around at this date. Thank you for voting, those of you who vote. Gaia's Hands has always been a problem child, where I know it's stunted in some day and can't figure out what's wrong with it. I feel like I should toss everything but the outline and restart it, but I don't know how.
2) I want to start a Kindle Scout campaign on Voyageurs on April 1 (not kidding!) for Voyageurs. I'm scared, wondering if it's
- too soon after the first book failure
- me making an embarrassment of myself
- too ambitious
3) Camp NaNo people -- I'm registered for Camp under "lleachie". Anyone want to hop into a cabin with me?
4) I'm still enjoying Spring Break, but I'm back in town after my story collecting trip to The Elms. The food was good, the coffee was good, the people were excellent.
5) As always, I'm glad you're here.
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