posted
Time travel has been done to death, and my sci-fi knowledge is by no means encyclopedic, so I wouldn't be at all surprised if it's been tackled like this before. In fact I'd been astonished if it hadn't been. Still, this is probably the best story I've written so far so I'm not about to curl up in the fetal position and give it up.
quote: “Chance of success?” “97% all’s sunshine, but that’s with no accidents” “And the other 3%?” “The human race is enslaved by giant clams” “Very funny” “You know what I mean. The computer’s pretty good at modelling cause and effect, but it’s far from perfect.”
Marcus considered the odds. 97% wasn’t bad odds, missions had been launched with positivity probabilities as low as 93%, but he still wasn’t entirely comfortable. Glen was right, a little bit of bad luck and who know's what could happen. Knowing that it would be another Marcus who would be cleaning up, wasn't much comfort.
I'm not quite ready for readers, but I'd love critiques on the first 13. Specifically I'm wondering whether using dialogue before introducing the characters is confusing, and whether it's sufficiently clear that they are discussing the positive negative effects of making a change sometime in the past.
[This message has been edited by smncameron (edited February 15, 2008).]
posted
Speech tags. That's the biggest problem with the opening. I do like that it is all dialog but it would help if we had some idea who is saying what. You can do that in your dialog. For example...
"Very funny, Glen."
If this is about time travel I think you need to change those percentage numbers. A three percent failure rate is way too much to risk if it means altering reality in unforseen ways. Better make that margin a lot smaller.
posted
You're probably right about the probability. 97% was just the first number that popped into my head. 99.7% it is. Although (as the story goes on to explain) unless the changes prevent the creation of the time-travel outfit, they can be modified in turn.
I'm a bit more reluctant to use speech headings, because it just doesn't sound natural to me. If it's causing confusion I'll figure out a way to change it.
posted
I just finnished reading OSC's rules for Time travel in "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy". I had a pretty good understanding of them before, but he lists them in a very precise way. You may find that helpful.
I agree with snapper on the tags. spelling error- modeling I think the repetition in the "percents" below isn't nescessary. That prime real estate could be used for something to bring more details into the story. Otherwise I like the intro. It got my interest. I am no editor but if you need a reader to test your time travel usage or plot strength, I could use the crit practice.
[This message has been edited by Bent Tree (edited February 15, 2008).]
posted
I've read the book, but I'm not positive on his rules for time travel. I'm not too concerned if I'm violating them either. He's a great writer, but if you follow the rules time travel is impossible. If you've decided to cross that pretty formidable barrier I figure you can do anything you bloody well please.
Posts: 161 | Registered: Dec 2007
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quote:whether it's sufficiently clear that they are discussing the positive negative effects of making a change sometime in the past.
There's nothing in the first 13 that mentions time travel or changing the past. The reference to "another Marcus" is vaguely puzzling, but one would only associate it with changing the past (and by implication, the present) if one knew this was a time travel story. (The only specific mentions of time travel are in your comments on the story.) From the dialogue, they could just as easily be discussing a mission in a space-ship, or a submarine.
Every idea, including time travel, has been done before, and there's no reason not to do it again. (I did see advice somewhere that editors were not buying time travel stories, then I saw one published in a major magazine just a short while later. I think they'll buy anything if it's a good story.) The trick, as you surmise, is to do it with a unique angle. I like time travel stories, when they're done well.
“97% all’s sunshine, but that’s with no accidents” -- if the 97% assumes no accidents, then the chance of success is not 97%, it's less. Shouldn't they should be estimating the probability of accidents as well? Otherwise the 97% statistic is surely meaningless. The seeming inaccuracy blew me out of the story because I would expect them to be more careful with their mathematics. Indeed, if it's time travel, I'd expect them to be estimating liklihood of success in the 99.lots-of-nines-% range, because just one mistake will eliminate their present. (99.7% means three trips in one thousand will fail--even 20th century airliners do a lot, lot better than that.)
Some people don't like stories that leap straight into dialogue. I'm not one of them, I'll happily listen to the characters, watch them do things, and figure it out along the way.
Hope this helps, Pat
[This message has been edited by TaleSpinner (edited February 16, 2008).]
[This message has been edited by TaleSpinner (edited February 16, 2008).]
posted
Their's a book on rules of time travel? TIme travel isn't possible, how can there be rules for something that isn't real? Speculative Fiction, my friends. That's what we write. Just make the un-plausable seem plausable for most of us and you'll be on the right track.
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posted
Apparently these folks think it's coming this year New Scientist article (this is pay-to-read (I didn't), but if you google relevant terms you'll get other hits - NS was the origin)
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posted
Come on! If time travel was possible, wouldn't we be visited by someone in the future? Wouldn't some greedy person expose themself by playing winning number in the lottery or betting on nothing but winners or never missing in the stock market by now? Wouldn't this be a great time to get rich by bringing back the future form of energy to replace that dirty, expensive, oil based fuel? If time travel were possible we should have seen a time traveler or the probe by now.
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