My Writing 'Career' - Notes - 2003 to 2006

Even during these lean times in my writing 'career', I was known as the writer to my friends. Since high school, I've been that guy. It's not the first thing I mention to people when I met them and sometimes it's something I don't like bringing up because so much of what I've written is fan fiction but it's something that does get mentioned eventually.

As a result, when Katy and Eric were heading to Japan for a year, Eric set up a website with a forum for family and friends to communicate together on. We could pretend we were together having conversations as a group. One of the default sections was 'Steve's Literary Corner'. Given a place to play, I felt I should. Some older stuff was uploaded to it and I started to play in the short story venue for the first time in years, just playing a little, doing some fun stuff.

Before they left, they also said 'You should come visit us while we're there.' I politely hemmed and hawed a little to which they noted 'How often are you going to know people in Japan?' It was a good point. I spent about a week there with them in late April/early May 2004. It was a brilliant time. I'm glad I went and look to return someday.

I wrote a diary of those days as 'Notes from Japan'. While walking around chatting with Eric, I noted that I had a line in head that had been stuck there since I got off the plane, something about checking the Godzilla detection system and seeing it at a low setting for my trip. I felt there was a story brewing. Eric agreed as he's generally filled with the enthusiasm for accomplishing things.

Not unlike high school, I was writing to a specific audience, writing a fictional tale based on the adventures of me and my friends. It was fun. Fun means more writing. I got fired up again.

It didn't take long for the Doctor to poke his head into this series of adventures. Rather than retread old territory, I pushed myself to do something a little different. To make up for the bad Tom Baker fan fiction that had been the 'Dr. What' series, I didn't bring my Doctors into the story, but rather the 4th Doctor, Romana, and K-9. I had to write to those characters, locking myself into a more specific style for them. It was more fun than I expected. I also wrote one part of the story in script form, something I hadn't done much of in the past. That was also fun. I was stretching my skills out and doing different things while doing the same thing. It helped me learn.

Upon their return from Japan, I continued the story in America, introducing a thread that would end up becoming a grand anniversary story, tying together threads from all the things I'd ever written, well, mostly everything. Unfortunately, by then the forum had gotten attacked by spammers and lies rotting in the Internet sun. The last few stories are the best things I've wrote that hardly anyone has read.

The forum and the trip had accomplished their goal. My creative brain was firing on all cylinders again. New story ideas that weren't directly based on something were populating in my head. There were places to go and people to meet.

The novel, the start of the Steveverse, had a draft completed and, as noted previously, needs 'something' in order to work properly. It sits waiting while other parts of the Steveverse get explored. It's primary goal, to start things off, was accomplished. Other things need their own attention now.