Myke Cole – author of ShadowOps: Control Point, first in the ongoing ShadowOps trilogy – graciously returns to the Roundtable to help workshop a tale by writer John Walker. John’s story idea is the second in his series the Statford Chronicles about a scruffy gumshoe who is also the defender of humanity. When his character is called upon to defend the Devil, Myke, Brion, and Dave step up to lend a hand. Mythology, religion, gumshoes, murder, and the Devil… sounds like a recipe for mayhem, and we certainly dove in to the fray! (and do yourself a favor by checking out Myke’s Showcase Episode! The man has much writerly goodness to offer)
PROMO: The Supervillain Corner Podcast (http://supervillaincorner.podbean.com/)
Workshop Episode 15 (Guest Host: Myke Cole)
[caution: mature language – listener discretion is advised]
Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:11:36 — 65.6MB)
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Coming Up for Myke…
- Sequel to ShadowOps: Control Point – titled “Fortress Frontier” – comes out Jan 2013 from Ace
- Third in the series – “Breach Zone” – will hit stands Jan 2014
- Essay on post-traumatic stress on the characters of George R. R. Martin’s “Game of Thrones” series appears in the recently published “Beyond the Wall“
- Also a new series idea and additional ShadowOps books to be pitched to the publisher (yes!). Stay on top of all the news at Myke’s Website: http://mykecole.com
From John Walker…
- “The Sincerest Form of Flattery“, first in The Statford Chronicles series
I always suspected Dave and Brion were psychopaths…
I have a thought, and bare with me as I’ve not yet finished listening to the episode I have about a half hour to go, but I wanted to throw this out there before I forgot about it.
John, you said that you wanted to keep God (and by that I mean the currently ruling Jehovah) out of things, preferring instead to stick with His angels. You also need a compelling reason why the killing of this priest — above and beyond his status as the future father of the messiah. What if… and go with me here… what if God Himself is in the priest? Perhaps using the priest as his Avatar to father his next Son? So, if the priest’s mortal body was killed while God was in him, the perhaps God himself is either now destroyed or otherwise shifted elsewhere and now in peril or out of the picture entirely? This would give His angels an incredible amount of rage and need for vengeance, plus now that God is out of the picture, there’s your reason for the Apocalypse. So what our hero needs to do is not only prove that the Devil didn’t do it (and Brion was right, Satan needs to be the most charming son of a bitch you’ve ever seen, and we need to love him, so that in the end when the final twist is revealed and his truly plan comes to light, we delight in being suckered in by him), but he also needs to somehow restore the balance.
As for your antagonist, him seeing the end of the universe as a good thing is actually fairly believable. Like Alfred said, some men just want to watch the world burn. Don’t run from that. But, at the same time, OWN IT. He wants to be the father of the messiah because he wants to be the herald of a New Age.
Now, Brion’s other idea about some or all angels wanting to end the universe so that a new Good can come and replace things isn’t bad either. In fact, I quite like it. But there has to be a believable motive for it above and beyond good intentions. There has to be a catalyzing factor. In Supernatural the angels go rouge because God has abandoned Creation. In your story, maybe it’s because they feel like humanity no longer deserves to live after one of the kills God.
So now you have a motive for their desire to end everything, and you have a motive for why your real antagonist wants to end everything. The only thing left is to find out what the Devil’s real motives and plans are. Give him the final twist, and this will be a winner.
I like that, Justin. I like it a lot. The Spirit of God inhabiting the priest ups the stakes, but that should probably come in a reveal later in the story.
I was kind of thinking, as I listened to the podcast, that a rogue group of angel’s orchestrated the death of the priest. Possibly to bring about Armageddon and thus usher in the new Good. Maybe they see God as having become lazy. He hasn’t done much since Jesus, and the older gods are muscling in to take over his territory, so these angels think they can remake the world. Or taking on your idea of God being in the priest (isn’t that how the Messiah would be created-first by the virgin birth, but this time it needs to be through the physical act), maybe only a few angels know and one of them sees the opportunity to kill God and take over. So he/she orchestrates the murder, and plants the evidence. Perhaps another of the angels (or a group) is working with this angel, and is also a truthsayer. For the privilege of being the new right hand of the new God the truthsayer helps corroborate the evidence. It could be that actual angel, the one wanting to take over, who was doing the whispering, stating that he was the devil. This would certainly piss off Satan. I don’t think he wants another fallen angel. Especially a power grabbing one.
Honestly, I felt this episode was a hard one to workshop from the bleachers, and I commend the hosts for an excellent job. There was so much that was kept hidden. We don’t know the antagonist at all, and the overarching story and milieu are “outlined” through seven books already. Great stuff to work with, but not sure how much the writer gained. I certainly understand that in a mystery some details need to be left for the final reveal. Still a great episode and much wisdom to absorb from our hosts.
I really enjoyed Myke Cole as the Guest Host. I learned from him and can’t wait to get my hands on the first Shadow Ops book. Control Point sounds awesome.
Hi, folks! Yeah, I’m the John Walker from the podcast, and I did get a lot out of the workshop. I’ve taken a lot of the ideas brought in from Myke and Brion and Dave, and have pretty much restructured most of the book. Ah, it was only 15k words I had to nuke. I’m having too much fun writing it.
Pretty much I’ve gotten rid of the “killing” and it’s just exile, but to a dark and lonely place for a couple of eons. The antagonist for this book is revealed relatively early; it’s just a matter of getting proof. It’s kind of hard to mash 50k words into a paragraph… Sorry!
I do want to thank Brion, Dave and Myke for giving me the opportunity to get a different (and better!) take on the story, and thank you Justin and Michael for some really REALLY great ideas. Some of these ideas are quite versatile, and don’t necessarily need to be just Christian. Thanks again!