Monday, October 4, 2010

Retelling of the Tater Salad story, by Dashade Ashanten

I got thrown out of a bar in Stormwind City. Now when I say I got thrown out of a bar, I don't mean someone asked me to leave, and we walked to the door together, and I said, "Bye, everybody, I gotta go." Four warriors, a paladin and a death knight hurled my ass out of a bar like I was shot out of a cannon. Those big ol' guy who thinks fighting's a cool job. They just talk about fighting. They get together with other fighters and talk about fighting. They go home and shine their armor and beat off.

*Retarded voice* "I can see my reflection in the armor!" *stupid laugh*

I walk in a bar with a hat on; this guy, real pissy, goes "Take off the hat!" I'm like, "What's the deal?" "I'll tell you what the deal is - gay people in this area wear hats like that and we're trying to keep 'em out of our club." I was like, "Oh really? The only way we can tell in Gnomeregan is if they have their hair cut like - yours." And he got all pissed.

Anyway, I took off the hat, and he walked away. About an hour later, I was drinking and I forgot. Ever forget? It happened to me. Now, I'm between 3'1" and 3'6", depending on which police lineup I'm in, and this guy is pokin' me on the shoulder with 2 fingers. He said, "That's it, you're outta here!" I said, "I don't think so, Scooter." I was wrong. They hurled me out of that bar, and then they decided to square off with me in the alley. But I backed down 'cause I didn't know how many of them it was going to take to whip my ass, but I knew how many they were going to use. That's a handy piece of information to have, right there.

The cops were called 'cause we broke a chair on the way out and I refused to pay for it. I refused to pay for it because we broke it over my thigh, and at that point I had the right to remain silent... but I didn't have the ability. The cop was like, "Mr. Ashanten, you are being charged with drunk... in... public!" I was like, "Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey! I was drunk in a bar. They threw me into pub-lic. I don't want to be drunk in public, I want to be drunk in a bar, which is perfectly legal... Arrest them!" They didn't arrest them. Instead, they had me do a field sobriety test. That's where you stand on 1 foot, raise the other foot 6" off the ground and count to 30. I made it to "wuh" before I fell over. "Is that gonna be close enough?" It wasn't close enough, so they call in for my arrest record. There's some good news! Spell arrays are linkin' up in outer space, computer banks in Gnomeregan are kickin' on... There's a morse code recorder in Thousand Needles going *beep beep ba-deep beep beep beep ba-deep...* This part takes a while... *beep ba-deep beep beep... BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-BE-Be* ... Short-hand... BOOP!

Anyway, I told you that story to tell you this story. When I was 17, was arrested for being drunk... in... public. There seems to be a pattern here. If you knew Morse Code, you'd already know that. One public intoxication charge, which was a bogus charge because they were stopping everybody that was riding a horse down that particular part of the castle throne room...and that's profilin' ...and profilin' is wrong. The arresting officer, who I had literally known all my life, you know what I mean? This guy lived four doors down from me in a town of less than 400 people. We've met. Anyway, at the station, he asks me if I have any aliases. And I was just being a smartass and said, "Yeah, they call me... Tater Salad." Seventeen years later, I'm handcuffed to a bench with blood comin' out my nose, this cop comes up to me and says, "Are you Dashade... 'Tater Salad' Ashanten?" You caught me! You caught the Tater! You can take down those roadblocks now.

Saturday, October 2, 2010

A Taste Of Things To Come!

Semi-spoilers follow!

Lorimarko Camino is currently en route to the Isles of Steam, although specifically, he's following the Dark Vigil, which is in transit...

Veln is currently at war with the celestial armies back in the Holy Lands...

Dagriz is currently on the run and causing havoc in the Kingdoms...

Vincent is currently in the Isles of Steam with Dash, Lyri and Dean...

But what about the rest of the world? Excluding the continent Lor comes from, there's two more sections of world that haven't even been MENTIONED...

One of those is the Dark, where eternal night reigns supreme and fuels the terror a vampire family lords over the lands with... However, without darkness, there can't be light, and the Dark is where the Light shines the brightest...

And in the Homelands, a new breed of humans stops hiding and starts organizing... What will the Changelings bring to the rest of the world?

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

The Future of Unda Vosari?

I had a great and glorious world envisioned when I saw the end of Unda Vosari, at least originally... But that's slowly changing.

I'm not sure I want Vincent to leave a better world for his children. I think I want him to fail. I think I want to see part of the world destroyed in a war unlike any other - one that destroys the high fantasy and ends magic, or at least magic as the world knows it. Gods and books no longer bestow magic, but it comes from within, because magic without has been destroyed.

Thoughts? Opinions?

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Book Plans!

As you may all know, Unda Vosari: Legends has been released. That's old news. Older news is, I originally intended to have a minimum of fifteen or so books.

That's changed, as my last post has declared. I fully intend on scrapping three books entirely and turning them into ONE book with THREE parts, known tentatively as Unda Vosari: Confrontations.

Mind you, the stories themselves haven't changed - just the names. The second story (known formerly as Unda Vosari: Travels) is being renamed to Unda Vosari: Crossings, and will be the first story in Confrontations. The second story will remain Campaigns, and will deal with the fallout of events involving Dagriz. Finally, Unda Vosari: Crusades will still deal with Veln and the Holy Lands, as well as fallout from THOSE events.

The third book (Unda Vosari: Cataclysm) will tie up the loose ends of all those stories, as well as the (still upcoming) Unda Vosari: Dark Corners book, which is a series of short stories that tie into Legends, Confrontations and Cataclysm. Cataclysm is going to be followed up by Unda Vosari: Blood Ties, which explores the relationship between Vincent, his family, the Baron, Dagriz and the crew that's followed Vincent around the world.

The Origins stories are to follow, of course, as well as the "Tales Of..." series.

More news to come!

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Old Stuff Is Good Stuff!

Wa-a-a-a-a-ay back when, I originally had the idea for fifteen novels, only five of which actually involved "the main characters." At that time, the main characters were...

Vincent, Lyri, Dash and Dean ("The Core Four")
Malim and Lorelei (the political characters)
Dorilys, Janimba, Linden and Myranel (the spiritual/magical characters)

The first story was to be Unda Vosari with no subtitle. Taking a cue from most novels that are put into a series, I kept the Unda Vosari title and added subtitles to each novel.

Unda Vosari: Legends - The story that sets in motion the events that take place in the other novels.

Unda Vosari: Steampunk - The Isles of Steam are explored and the Baron is hunted down. This eventually evolved from Dash and his origins, which tie in and end up with the meeting of Vincent and Dash, and the defeat of the Baron, to Unda Vosari: Travels, which deals less with the past and more with the present.

Unda Vosari: Holy War - Vincent did some shit in the first book involving this guy named Veln. This story revolved around Veln and a war that had very little to do with the crew of the Dark Vigil, and NOTHING to do with the Kingdoms (as of the end of the novel). It was ripped to shreds and became Unda Vosari: Confrontations, which has a lot more to do with some of the crew of the Dark Vigil, and indirectly involves the Kingdoms.

Unda Vosari: Military - Vincent did some shit in the first book involving this guy named Dagriz. This story revolved around Dagriz and a war that had a WHOLE LOT to do with the Kingdoms, but nothing to do with the original crew of the Dark Vigil, and was a "stand-alone" plot that really didn't need to be told. It was scrapped and evolved into Unda Vosari: Commanders, which now involves Lorelei, Malim, Nova, Dorilys and some of the other crew members dealing with Dagriz and the repercussions of some of the events of the first novel.

Unda Vosari: World At War - This was the culmination, climax and resolution of the three previous stories. Veln, Dagriz, the Baron, the Dark Vigil, the Kingdoms and everyone in the previous stories resolved their conflicts, but it still left a lot of loose threads, like... the entire reason Vincent (who comes back to the Kingdoms now) was going after the Baron. This evolved into Unda Vosari: Cataclysms.

After UV:WaW, I had Generations, which involved a race from the Isles of Steam, the trolls, invading the Kingdoms (who were now mostly at peace). Of course, this was long after the heroes from the other novels retired - this was their children. That was followed by Unda Vosari: Infiltration, which was about the troll spies (who can somehow NOT BE GREEN-SKINNED TROLLS WITH TUSKS) infiltrating and empowering Octavia (for no reason at all besides the fact I said so). Unda Vosari: Formation came next, which is when Octavia sort of takes over the world with the help of the trolls. Naturally, Unda Vosari: Rebellion came next, which had nothing to do with the Rebellion in the Isles of Steam that already existed, but was Cederlord rebelling against the Empire of Octavia. The whole shebang was wrapped up with Unda Vosari: Confrontation, which was when all hell broke loose (again) and the world made itself right (again).

But wait! I wasn't done trying too hard! I had Unda Vosari: Bloodlines, which was the GRANDCHILDREN of the original heroes... The Empire was destroyed and the Republic of Unda Vosari was attacked by the Isles of Steam, who were using things from the Savage Lands, which was the one quarter of the world that wasn't explored (the northwest had the kingdoms, the northeast had the holy lands, the southwest had the isles, and the southeast had remained a mystery). Then Unda Vosari: Civil War, which was the "reveal" that showed the Infernals from WAY BACK WHEN were to blame for everything, including the war with the Isles of Steam... Unda Vosari: Invasion was when the Infernals, now without refuge, found new refuge in audacity. That was followed by Unda Vosari: Domination, which was the Republic (now including the Isles of Steam) getting severely beaten by the Infernals... Ultimately, only one group of people could save the world... Vincent and his crew were summoned THROUGH TIME using YE' OLDE MAGICAL ARTIFACTS FROM THE SAVAGE LANDS, as were the children of Vincent and his crew... This all took place in Unda Vosari: Bloodties.

You can see how I randomly got ideas and ran with them.

Ultimately, the last ten stories were scrapped. Without having to resort to "the next generation" and "future generations" of the heroes, I could easily tell the story I wanted to without having to go that route. The last ten stories, as much as I don't want to admit it, were me trying to run a game, not tell a story. It'd have been a great Dungeons and Dragons story, but it wasn't meant to be.

Fifteen stories. That's a whole lot of writing. As it is, there's still Legends, Travels, Commanders, Confrontations and Cataclysms, which are the first five stories. I've also been going through and writing bits and pieces of the next series of stories under the Unda Vosari banner, the Origins stories.

Unda Vosari Origins is going to tell the stories of the origins of the heroes. Dashade is probably coming first, followed by one for Vincent, Dean, Lyri and Alasse. I've also got the "Unda Vosari: Tales of ..." stories which will feature historical events that created the world that Unda Vosari: Legends. First on that list is "Tales of Cederlord," which describes the fall of Cederlord. Tales of Rosnet explains why they secluded themselves away from the rest of the world by the time UV:Travels happens, and what the winged elves have to do with it. Finally, Tales of Octavia explains the history of Dagriz and Dorilys, and how their fates were intertwined long before they knew the other even existed.

I'm biting off more than I can chew, right? Not at all. Commanders, Confrontations and Cataclysms will be sold as ONE book - Unda Vosari: Compilations. Cheaper on you, easier for me to write, and I have a reason to publish a giant paperback, instead of having to worry about the cost and page counts and all that.

So, two more books, plus the "Dark Corners" book, which is just some short stories that tie things together (and it's already being written), and the Origins book, which is the five stories... Then the three prequel stories, which is another book...

I've also got a lot of stories I want to tell that happen in between and alongside the main stories. Don't forget, while Vincent is raising hell in the Isles of Steam, Dagriz is raising hell in the Kingdoms and Veln is raising hell in the Holy Lands, there's still that unexplored and untapped quarter of the world (roughly). That's touched upon in Dark Corners, and the story of Lorimarko and his crew of airship pirates is followed in all three of the stories in Unda Vosari: Compilations, even though he's only introduced in Dark Corners. There's also six wars going on (only four of which are the fault of Vincent) that have a story to be told, and a lot of stories can happen in a war... let alone six.

The point of all this is, I found all my old notes and the bits and pieces I'd written for the previously mentioned fifteen novels. I'm going to salvage what I can from it and rewrite it as needed, because some of it, in my opinion, is very well written, so the writing process is going to be sped up a bit.

If anyone's interested, the Quotes page of Unda Vosari (on Facebook, found here) is going to have a few more quotes as well, simply because there's some great lines I came up with.

Take care!
-B-

Sunday, September 5, 2010

The Unda Vosari Blog!

People have been wondering what's going on with the book, and why I'm not really making things public.

I've decided to do so now. Thus, this blog is born!

Whenever some writing gets done, or when some major event involving the book occurs, I'll be posting it here.

Current Word-Count of Unda Vosari: Travels - 7,687
Current Word-Count of Unda Vosari: Dark Corners - 4,360

To give you some perspective...

Unda Vosari: Legends - 104,169

HARRY POTTERS
Philosopher’s Stone....77,325
Chamber of Secrets.....84,799
Prisoner of Azkaban...106,821
Goblet of Fire........190,858
Order of the Phoenix..257,154
Half Blood Prince.....169,441
Deathly Hallows.......198,227

Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe...36,363
Anna Karenina...349,736
War and Peace...587,287
Gone with the Wind...418,053
The English Patient...82,370
A Prayer for Owen Meany...236,061
Crime and Punishment...211,591
The Brothers Karamazov...364,153
Sense and Sensibility...119,394
Great Expectations...183,349
Ender’s Game...100,609
Moby Dick...206,052
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory...30,644
Emma...155,887
The Hours...54,243
The Golden Compass...112,815
The Fellowship of the Ring...177,227
The Two Towers...143,436
The Return of the King...134,462
The Lord of the Rings...455,125
The Tenth Circle...114,779
My Sister’s Keeper...119,529
A Tale of Two Cities...135,420
White Teeth...169,389
Atonement...123,378
The Mouse and the Motorcycle...22,416
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn...109,571
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer...69,066
One Hundred Years of Solitude...144,523
Memoirs of a Geisha...186,418
Snow Falling on Cedars...138,098
Cold Mountain...161,511
Midnight’s Children...208,773
A House for Mr. Biswas...198,901
All the Pretty Horses...99,277

This was from an external website... Anyway. More news as news is made!