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In reply to the discussion: UFOs explained [View all]PoindexterOglethorpe
(25,746 posts)I do write science fiction, I've had a handful of stories published, even recently edited an anthology. Alas, I do not seem to have what it takes to write an entire novel. Several years back I attended the Taos Toolbox, a truly wonderful workshop run by the fabulous Walter Jon Williams, co-taught by Nancy Kress. The portions of the novel I was then working on had every single attendee, plus Walter and Nancy say, "This is not a novel. Maybe a novella, but not a novel." Alas, I don't seem to be adept at putting in the complexity that a novel needs to be a novel.
I'm at my best at flash fiction length. I think my longest published story is 3,000 words. Mostly I'm 500 words or less. Sadly, the market for flash fiction is limited.
As for the science in my dinosaur novel, meaning the time travel thing, it can be finessed. I can have a narrator that only knows time travel has been invented. But there are so many moving parts, that I get lost.
Plus, I think about a lot of world-building kinds of things, such as: what kind of pets would they have had? We humans mostly have cats or dogs (I'll simply ignore all the other kinds of pets for this discussion) which are four-legged furry mammals, and among the things we love about them is that four-legged furriness. So if you're a kind of lizard, what sort of pet would you have?
Also, did they have professional sports? That's a huge part of our culture, even if you personally don't give a flying fuck about any sport. How about schooling for the young? It goes on and on, and I get stuck sometimes thinking about these things.
Oh, and here's something else. In our present, all humans are the same species but we have a number of vastly different cultures, not to mention different languages, food, religions. It's easier to present my dinosaurs as all being the same culture and language, but . . . . It's part of the problem of s-f presenting alien species, or even as is part of this thread, aliens who might be visiting this planet. On this planet we have more than one culture, more than one language. Why assume it would be any different with aliens?
I am an avid reader of science fiction. I love time travel stories, even though time travel is probably impossible. I love stories in which humans have populated the galaxy with faster than light travel, even though that's probably impossible. I make a strong distinction between fiction and reality.
Thank you for your kind words.