FIRST THOUGHTS ON NEW PROJECT
Posted on January 22, 2015
Next month, I'll be starting on a time travel, science fiction series that I'm very excited about. Here's the first page or so of brainstorming. I don't generate a summary as much as scraps of ideas and some quotes that reflect the feel of the book. Many often don't make it in the final product, but they serve as a springboard.
Brainstorming for Angus Farseek: The Untimely Agent
Premise: Time merchants snatch people from certain death outcomes and offer them a chance to serve as Untimely Agents.
A true intergalactic endeavor. Agents work other planets so they don't go back in time and cause any paradoxes to their own past. Only a few are relegated to actually working on their own homeworlds.
Angus is sent to Agent Academy (Untimely University) and goes through the ropes of becoming an agent with several other classmates, a very eclectic alien cast. There are three other Earthers in his class, an older man, a young boy, and a girl just a few years younger than him.
It's considered bad karma to talk about your cliffhanger, but the girl character is obsessed with it.
Angus is assigned to Earth because the higher ups see something in him or hint that they know he has a key role in the impending chrono clash.
I need to develop a suitable villain to go up against the Untimely Agents. I want their motivation to be that they know if they riddle the timeline with enough paradoxes, they can effectively hit the restart button and create a reality where they don't meet an untimely death.
Multi-part series with each book right between 40,000-55,000 words so I can do one a year.
Possible Titles: Angus Farseek: Untimely Agent, Destiny's Detour, Time Mine, Lack of Death, Station at the End of Time
Some quotes from the story:
"You now exist outside of the time stream in what we call untime."
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"In the result of untimely death, your soul will be returned to your original dimension and timeline to finish off your true demise, your reality none the wiser of your absence."
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"A lifetime of adventure or another few seconds of life. You decide. But hurry¯I have a 3:15. Tractor accident. Farm boys make great agents. All bright-eyed and full of pep."
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"The Snog is coming. It eats away at reality and threatens to end life as we know it. Typical Tuesday stuff."
"And what's a typical Wednesday?"
"Cleaning up after saving the universe. Be thankful I didn't pick you for our janitorial division. Nothing fun about mopping up a black hole or plumbing a time leak."