Ugh...

This last month has been one hell of a month.

I started by slowly moving into my new apartment, something that took, give or take, a month to do (and I’m still not done yet, as I’ve yet to receive my couch).  Allergy season also started with a bang, and lead to me getting a horrible cold in the process.

If you can, try to imagine suffering from two colds at once and not knowing it.  Not a pleasant experience to say the least.  As a result, I’ve been struggling through the past couple of weeks, a handful of Kleenex in my pocket wherever I went.

Now, as I’m getting settled in, and slowly getting my strength back, I’m starting to hop back into the site, and completing some things that I promised I would do a month ago, such as putting the finishing touches on the a new story, and getting a handful of new Flash Imaginations.

In the meantime, keep an eye open for some new Chronicle of Netheril Weekly Updates as well as some new maps showing up shortly.

Contest Results

As some of you were aware, there was a contest going on Folaji.com for the past two weeks (if you’re not sure what contest, read about it here).  The contest officially came to a close last night at 11h59 pm, and I’d first like to start by thanking everyone who participated.  The winner, along with the prize, will be announced on none other than Folaji.com’s second birthday, and since the purpose of the contest was for you to guess what this date was, I won’t mention just yet, so as to keep it a surprise.

Rest assured that there is a winner, so keep an eye on the site to find out if you’ve won!

Netheril Updates

Chronicles of Netheril Adventurers have been busy lately, questing in and around Loudwater.  As such, we have two new updates for the D&D adventure:

• A new Weekly Update dated July 17th and prepared by Ingram, which you can read here
• An update to the Chronicles of Netheril NPC page (with new NPC pictures)

Also of note, I’m preparing a tool that will allow updates to the Chronicle of Netheril’s NPC and Quest pages to be much faster.  The tool is still being built, so I can not say much about it just yet, but rest assured more will be divulged as development of the tool approaches completion.

New Short Story

As final news for today, I’m happy to announce that within the coming few weeks, a new short story will be posted on the site.  I’m trying something different with this story, in that I want to have finished writing it before it is published.  So far this has allowed for easier story writing and planning, and will also allow for the story’s five parts to be posted at regular intervals (which is looking like its going to be once per week).

So keep an eye out for this new story, which at current estimates, should be ready sometime in early August!

And that’s all I have to say for today.  Again, thanks to everyone who participated in the contest, and expect some interesting updates in the future.  In the meantime, I have a handful of new Flash Imaginations ready to hit the site, so expect those to show up shortly.

Just a quick update to let you know that Ezmereth’s Story Part 2 is now available.  You can read it by clicking the link below:

RAWR: Ezmereth Nemrin’s Story – Part 2

Enjoy!

• Halloween in Montreal – Finale Part 1 – Confession
• Halloween in Montreal – Finale Part 2 – 12:01 am

About Halloween in Montreal – **POSSIBLE SPOILERS BELOW** – You’ve been warned!

Now that the adventure is over, I wanted to talk a little bit about this short story, why I wrote it, where it came from, and what it means to me as a completed work.

Truth is, this story came about from two sources, one of which is my attempt at reliving childhood imagination, and the other my attempt at writing a non-fantasy work of fiction.

Childhood Imagination

One of my favourite movies is the flick Finding Neverland starring Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet, which follows the story of J. M. Barrie (the author Peter Pan).  The movie is truly amazing, both with its heart-wrenching story, as well as its depiction of J.M Barrie’s overactive imagination. Definitely a must see movie if you havn’t already seen it.

Although I don’t wish to compare myself to Mr. Barrie, I have to admit that I saw part of myself in his character.  Specifically, I connected with the character’s ability imagine things up at any time, and his portrayed fascination with childhood imagination.  Everyone has seen children playing on the street, and there is something magical at how they can conjure up and live out epic adventures in the matter of minutes, using mere sticks and stones as great weapons to defeat the evils of their stories.

I sometimes think back at the wars and battles I fought as a child, and find myself missing that feeling.  Then there are days like Halloween day 2009, where out of nowhere, my imagination wakes up and takes me on a wild ride, the result of which, in this case, was Halloween in Montreal.

Non-Fantasy & Fist Person

Although the majority of stories on Folaji.com are currently fantasy stories (either taking place in the realm of Warcraft or the imagined lands of a Dungeons and Dragons adventure), fantasy is not my favourite genre.  In fact, if I had to choose, I would probably pick Horror (à la Steven king) or Science-Fiction (à la Frank Herbert) as my favourite story genres.  That being said, I also like to push the envelope, and Halloween in Montreal was an attempt to do just that.

This is the first non-science, non-fantasy, fiction story that I’ve ever written.  I’ll admit it wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be.  The challenge was to embrace the childlike imagination I wrote about above, all the while keeping the story in the realm of “plausible possibility”.

I mean, who knew how hard it would be not to include a large Dragon, an army of Alien Warships, or Scary Ghosts in this story?  Well, for someone who’s imagination is often jumping around, it was a challenge.  By the end, however, I guess you could say I’d reached a point where I could focus my imagination to the realm of the possible, something I’d never attempted or achieved before.

This is also the first story I’ve ever written using the First Person point of view (have you noticed, we never learn the name of the hero in the story?).  Now there’s great debate out there about writing in the First Person, and I’m not looking to add to the debate other than to say that I do believe First Person point of views can be very useful in presenting a story, or part of a story, when used properly.

A known and accepted limitation of First Person writing, however, is that the reader only ever know what the central character knows, and you can not delve into other character’s thoughts.  Used in a certain way, however, this can allow the writer to create suspense and mystery, although you have to be careful not to make your story too confusing my keeping too much from your readers.

Conclusion

I’m glad I took on these two challenges and stuck to my guns, and I believe it made for an interesting story now that all is said and done.  With the final part of the story published, Halloween in Montreal now belongs to the Folaji.com archives, and was a fun ride while it lasted.  Although, just like real life, the story never really does end, and I may revisit this universe sometime in the future.

In the meantime, I have a few other projects that require my attention.

So, what did you think? Leave a comment letting me know!

Just wanted to post a quick update as to what’s going on as  I know the site has been static for the past little while.

First, I’m proud to say that the long awaited final part of “Halloween in Montreal” will be published this Friday.  The final chapter of this short story has been a tough write, what with all the answered questions and closure and what not.  That being said, its finally ready to be published, so keep an eye out for it.

Second, it looks like we’ll be treated to another DnD inspired short story from Alisttair.  As he noted on the latest RAWR post, Alisttair will be writing Ezmereth’s Story for publication on Folaji.com, a short story that will take a look at the character’s past in the world of RAWR.  I unfortunately don’t know much about Ezmereth, so all I can say right now is that I can’t wait to learn more about him… or her… or it…?

As a side note, Alisttair is also the author of War of the Soulhers: Dugar’s Story, a five part adventure that follows another one of his DnD alter egos in a ramp up to the War of the Soulhers DnD Adventure.  If you havn’t had the chance to read it yet, I encourage you to do so.

And finally, I’ve been kept busy on my end by some secret stuff.  What kind of secret stuff you ask?  Well, the kind of secret stuff that I can’t talk about, yet…  Although what I can say is that some of the secret stuff involves a new series on Folaji.com.

Alright, that’s all for now, see you guys on Friday.

In the meantime, for those of you following the RAWR adventure, Ingram was nice enough to provide an update that you can read here.

That being said, anybody looking for this week’s Blog Tools Review can find it on FuglyCode.com.  This week I detail a very important anti-spam plugin called Akismet, which you can read here.  Note that, as I stated previously, Blog Tools Reviews will now only be posted on FuglyCode.com, so head on over to the new site every Wednesday at 12pm EST for your weekly dose of blog plugin fun!

Also, after almost a year of hiatus, Rise of the X-Syndicate is back with Chapter 7 – The Fall.  I found this chapter extremely difficult to write, partly because I wasn’t to certain how I wanted to present the conflict in the chapter, and mostly because it truly is a backbone for so much of what’s to come.  With it now published, I feel like I’ve jumped a huge hurdle, and future chapters are all starting to fall into place.

And finally, although I am spending much time on FuglyCode right now, I still have big plans for this site.  I intend to begin adding new content over the next few months, which will allow the site to grow into a much more rounded and interesting site.  I don’t want to spoil anything so I’ll leave it at that for now.

Talk to y’all later!

I’ve been working on this new site for a couple of weeks now, and noticed that the content of the Blog Tools Review articles was much more suitable for this site than for Folaji.com.  And so I’ve ported the series over, and will continue on publishing Blog Tools Reviews everyweek on FuglyCode.com.

With the launch of the new site, I’ve not yet had the chance to publish Chapter 7 of Rise of the X-Syndicate.  I can say for a fact that it will be posted this week, so keep an eye out for a new Chapter of this World of Warcraft story.

In the meantime, I leave you with a montage of my dog Koji, playing with an 8 week old black lab named Ramsay.  Aren’t they adorable?

The result of that moment of inspiration is the short story Halloween in Montreal, the first non-fantasy story to be published on Folaji.com.  The short story consists of four parts that will be published over the coming week, and tonight I am proud to present you with part 1 of the story.

A quick note before we get to the link: this story contains some vulgar language and mature themes, so if you’re not into that kind of stuff, don’t click on the link below.  Otherwise, hope you enjoy!

Here’s the link: Halloween in Montreal - Crazy Lady

If you’ll look in the toolbar on the right of the screen, you’ll notice the Recent Chapters section has been replaced with a new Online Stories section.  These links will bring you to posts for each story, and each post will now have navigation links and a small table of contents embedded within them.

Series can also have logos, so if you want a logo for your story, feel free to send me an image of that logo by email.

Try this new feature out, and let me know what you think!