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Catastrophe Theory (Updated 12/07/22)

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  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    Hi, hi! So happy for this conversation!

    Here are my thoughts about....

    INTERPRETATION
    What central themes have you identified?

    -->Main theme: What to do with one's hands

    -->Which also ties into the sub-theme of managing life, relationships, communication, and choices within a complicated world with complicated people when one is neurodivergent and/or gifted (or a ghost.... who is also neurodivergent and gifted, but who does, usually, seem to know what to do with his hands, because, of course, he has a paint brush in one!)

    Are there themes or concepts you'd like to discuss further? (E.g.: how your relationship with death would be different in this universe---you personally---whether there's a protagonist, anything that influenced you, etc.)

    -->For me, it was the tender depiction of neurodivergence which spoke to me. Everyone in this story is weird. And it's accepted. I also get the feeling that everyone in this story is loved, by their author, and that helps me feel cheered, because their author lives in this world, our world, and if our world has individuals who carefully observe, tenderly regard, accept, and promote weird folk like me and the characters in this story, then our world becomes a little bit more OK.

    -->Something else I really enjoy, which verges on a theme, is the complicated nature of our perceptions and reality. The story--its heroes, rescuers, villains, and victims--can shift, depending on whose eyes we're looking through. My experience reading this story is one of suspension--I withhold predictions and choosing sides just to watch.

    Any relationships you'd like to discuss further? (E.g.: Mike and Bernard as foils, Shu and Charlie as foils, Claudia and Aileen as foils, Claudia and Kendra as foils, joining me in OTP squealing, etc.)
    Shu. Just, Shu. Seems like everyone's split on him and I love it.
    Okay, a light one: who's your favorite character?

    -->Definitely Jasper, though I had a pretty big crush on Charlie, until I learned about him stealing his sister's anatomy books. That whole scene was pretty twisted and just made me sad for Claudia.

    -->I really feel that what we've read so far is Claudia's story. The deepest writing comes in her chapters, and her chapters seem to crystalize all of the dynamics that affect everyone else.

    I'll write more--for now, it's time to put the butternut squash in the oven!
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    @CathyTea Whoa, whoa, whoa: CT is just exploring tired old concepts like love and death. I'm not ready to tackle the big mysteries like hand placement.

    I do love these guys, each and every one of them. I love their quirks and vices and viewpoints and voices. This is kind of a deconstruction of the "if everyone's super, no one is" mentality, because there are 20 different directions of weird going on here. A friend of mine believes that to love someone is to figure out what makes them unique---and if someone is weird, doesn't that make it easier to uncover that spark that makes them who they are?

    Feel cheered! I don't know what to say except you deserve the best. Maybe a large and varied friend group who wants to talk about mockingbirds singing along with the cello? (That's delightful; I don't know who wouldn't enjoy that.)

    There are a few definitions of 'neurodivergence' floating around: does yours include mental health disorders such as anxiety, depression, and PTSD? I feel like that's how Bernard would fit in. Bahahaha, yes, he's had a bit more time than the rest of us to figure out what to do with his hands.

    Let me just say, I'm over the moon about the character thing. One of my secret goals for CT is for every main character to be someone's favorite, rather than having one person carry the story. And there is ZERO OVERLAP between people who've disclosed their favorite character. Even if you allow for two favorites! And it covers eleven of the thirteen MCs! And that list includes myself, so that no one has the same favorite character as the author!!

    Gen and Jasper are an interesting pair of favorite characters to have. Was it the marigold bridge that did you in, or was it his flawless summary of Coco? Haha.

    Hope you enjoyed the squash. I'm married to someone who only eats orange food but we haven't had squash in a while.
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • FeroshaCoutoraFeroshaCoutora Posts: 142 Member
    I am the worst at the forums! Some days my ADHD brain looks me dead in the eye and is like: What even is a forum? Never heard of it. Don’t even remember it exists.

    But I digress.

    I promised on your blog not to write a novel, so I want to hold myself to that. One thing I’ve been turning over in my head is a combination of your questions about death and relationships to discuss further.

    I’m talking about Bernard.

    I’m going just put it out there for the jury, Bernard is everything precious in this world, and we barely deserve him. He is such a well-written character that I sometimes get a little angry when I read him. Like, how dare he be this delightful and complex?

    The thing that occurs to me now after the story is over is that Bernard is hopeful. He’s the most hopeful character in the story. And I don’t mean he “acts” hopeful; I mean Bernard is hopeful. He has evolved, changed, once he was one thing, and now he is another (metaphysically but also metaphorically too lol).

    I mean, listen, the thing about death is that it gives you a particular set of parameters. And sometimes, we don’t always get it right, you know? We spend a lot of time living for other people instead of ourselves, trapped in something that breaks our spirit (Claudia). Or maybe we are lazy about compassion; our skin is so thin, our conception of something mattering besides ourselves is so small, that we treat people like dirt (Mike).

    And then we run out of time. Somehow, some way. The how is less important than the fact that happens. But then here is Bernard, who finally decides to start working on himself, like a century after the fact. As long as time exists, the possibility for becoming ourselves, for making any sort of change is possible.

    So yeah, it’s imagination and gameplay that make this all possible. But that idea that you could start at any time and make some progress. I find that lovely and hopeful.

    Aw, man! I promised I would not write a novel.

    Sigh.

    Sorry.
    Dark Family Comedy & Paranormal Romance

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  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    CT! IS! BACK! ON! THE! MENU! Where the menu is for or what I'm referring to both have yet to be determined. If I'm overthinking, it has to be on the secret menu between the Meat Meltdown and the Nevada Licorice Fries.

    This time with a prologue that both clarifies and refuses to say outright what Kendra's up to: The Color of Fear

    (Ferosh, man, I'm sorry for leaving you hanging, I just had nothing to say to that breakdown on Bernard because it was perfect. Just warm fuzzies all around.)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • VanPelt81VanPelt81 Posts: 2,990 Member
    Good prologue. Loved the arguing over music from Kendra, Shu, & Wyatt in the prologue. Would love to see Shu's eventual reaction in the future when his ex is making venomous break-up songs about him while playing keyboards in a band of other weirdos. :D
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    @VanPelt81 That's quite the memory! Shu didn't bat an eye when his friend (accurately) called him 'Street Oedipus,' so I'm sure you can imagine a world where Chantel records a song that's just a list of the ways she would murder him and his response is "oh, cool! Six million plays on Simify! Good for her!"

    Plus, ViR's gotta go to Patton's and tear that mama out first.
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    And now Book III starts proper! We're ready to deal with the immediate fallout of Book II! Whee! Fun.

    I'm trying to figure out a way to make this clearer: the last post, the Prologue, is now meant to be the prologue for all three books, and it describes an event that happens in the middle of Book III. So if the chronological jump threw you off, that's what's been going on.

    (Fair warning: if you haven't at least read the last two chapters of Book II, S&L and RWE, this chapter's not going to make a whole lot of sense to you.)

    And that's all the meta stuff out of the way. Hector chapter? Hector chapter: Grand Theft (Pt. I)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    So I haven't been able to log into the forums before this; it turned out to be an issue with one of my privacy plug-ins. It's fixed! On to the delayed updates.

    I got tired of the Roman numerals a while back, but can't be bothered to go back and fix it at this point: Grand Theft (Pt. II)
    Space! Law! Space! Politics!: Grand Theft (Pt. III)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    edited May 2021
    It's! Back! Y'all!

    So my excuse for this is that there were a bunch of Haunted updates in the interim, and this is a Venus in Retrograde chapter, which are always going to be a challenge to write. There's a lot to keep track of with nine personalities.

    Very many words about everyone arriving at the community center: Unacknowledged Legislators, Remixed (Pt. I)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    Oh my goodness! Two at once!

    Unless you're getting your intel from Wordpress or Discord rather than the forums, then just the second one is new.

    So the fact that this one has lyrics for an entire rap song should explain the long hiatus: Unacknowledged Legislators, Remixed (Pt. II)

    And then this one was significantly lower key: Unacknowledged Legislators, Remixed (Pt. III)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    Goodness. We're almost done with the ViR chapter---okay, so, I had to split this one into two parts again and it still ended up being over 9k words.

    Let's mess with mean dudes in the club: Unacknowledged Legislators, Remixed (Pt. IV)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • VanPelt81VanPelt81 Posts: 2,990 Member
    Love the messing with mean dudes our ViR band members are doing. They're the heroes we don't deserve but the ones we need.
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    UUURGH. THE VIR CHAPTER IS FINALLY DONE AND OVER. OH MY GOODNESS. WE CAN ALL MOVE ON!

    Let's mess with mean dudes in the club hard: Unacknowledged Legislators, Remixed (Pt. V)
    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
  • VanPelt81VanPelt81 Posts: 2,990 Member
    yes, new chapter.
    Loved Juliet's stage climb and speaking her mind. Also loved Andrej's heroic "You Shall Not Pass" moment helping out our band of heroes and stopping that terrible dude in red.

    Feel sad about River's doubts but liked how they were able to have a long conversation with Chantel before the full effects of the chaotic night at Patton's got really crazy with that chase.
  • Dollyllama108Dollyllama108 Posts: 268 Member
    Thank you for reading and thank you for the characters!
    You know we had to bring back the crow. Andrej will not go gentle into that good night.

    With River's doubts during that conversation, I had the trope in mind where authors bring in black or gay characters to act as a magical sounding board for the white main character's problems. So while this conversation is supposed to establish the dynamic between River and Chantel, I wanted it to very much be "solve my problems!!"/"nope, I have my own stuff to deal with! ....but I'll also tell you what's up because you asked."

    Anyway, yes. They got interrupted but River and Chantel have a LOT more to talk about.
    VanPelt81 wrote: »
    yes, new chapter.
    Loved Juliet's stage climb and speaking her mind. Also loved Andrej's heroic "You Shall Not Pass" moment helping out our band of heroes and stopping that terrible dude in red.

    Feel sad about River's doubts but liked how they were able to have a long conversation with Chantel before the full effects of the chaotic night at Patton's got really crazy with that chase.

    banner_both.jpg
    Catastrophe Theory: If, through loose ends, we could resume/Unrav'ling defects from the loom/And soften as the shuttle mends---/Then save for me a few loose ends!
    Haunted: Picture Oscar Wilde dating Willy Wonka, also Oscar Wilde is still dead
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