jespah

Shuttlepod pilot, fan fiction writer, sentient marsupial canid.
Shuttlepod pilot, fan fiction writer, sentient marsupial canid.
29
May
2012

Progress Report – May 2012

May 2012 was a month for experimenting.

May 2012 Posted Works

This month saw several additions on Star Trek Logs as I simultaneously pulled back from posting all but the essentials at Trek BBS. The Trek BBS has, to its credit, a lot of users, so there’s the potential for a greater audience there. But I’m just not getting a lot of comments. Hence it’s discouraging and, frankly, I’ve got better uses for my time right now. For me, it makes more sense to respond to challenges there and attempt to build more of a readership. Then I may go back to posting more of my backlog there. But not right now. I finished spooling out Together and that will be it for my backlog there, as of now.

Star Trek Logs

Postings on Star Trek Logs included Barking up the Muse Tree | Janet Gershen-Siegel | jespah | Quill | May 2012a diverse collection of mostly stories from the In Between Day series although there were a few different items tucked in there. From the In Between Days backlog, I posted Voracious, Harvest, First Born, Apple, A Kind of Blue, Brown and Friday Visit. New In Between Days stories were The Rite, Party on Risa, Penicillin, Protocols, Pacing and Cobbled Together.

An In Between Days offshoot story was a somewhat revamped version of There’s Something About Hoshi, which now dovetails a bit better into my E2 universe. I added a quickie story filling in a missing scene from the Two Days and Two Nights canon episode, called Party on Risa. The Gina Nolan/post-Dominion War universe (Hold Your Dominion) was advanced with Good-Bye.

And I followed up It Had to Be You with That’s Not My Name, which is a prequel to It Had to Be You. I also finished Reversal and began posting Intolerance. Because there have been so many stories posted there, I will finish Intolerance and then hold off for a while so that readers can catch up a bit.

Ad Astra

On Ad Astra, I cross-posted Cobbled Together, Protocols, The Mess and Good-Bye. I posted Harvest (which was cross-posted onto Star Trek Logs, see above). The Facts was also posted, as was the continuation of the Bron-Sophra romance, entitled Truth. In response to the monthly challenge, I posted Equinox, a story that made me a bit nervous but it was well-received so I’m pleased.

I also added And the Livin’ is Easy and First Born in context, and began to spool out You Mixed-Up Siciliano. My response to the monthly challenge (about former enemies working together) is in the Gina Nolan universe and is underway. It’s called Wider than the Sargasso Sea.

More Postings

Furthermore, on Fanfiction.net, I finished spooling out Intolerance and began to post Together. Once Together is finished, I’ll probably fill in some more of my K- and K+-rated backlog before tackling Temper.

In addition, on Trek United, I added Brown as a part of releasing more of my backlog there. Publishing there is more difficult because of the way their posting software is configured. This can create frustration, which is why I rarely post longer material there these days.

On TrekBBS, I decided to respond to their challenge about civilians with Local Flavor. The story is about Doug and Lili’s first day on Lafa II.

In addition, Kirok of L’Stok has a draft of Flight of the Bluebird and is planning to release it on Issuu with the remainder of the current Daranaean stories, except for Hearts in Time.

WIP Corner

My works in progress include the E2 stories. I am close to being finished with the third of four books. Plus there’s various amounts of tweaking that go on in the earlier books, in order to make them work better.

Prep Work

I’ve worked on my website and on cleaning up stories for publication on sites like Trek BBS and Fanfiction.net. However, I am a little worried about Fortune as it contains quotations from the earlier books and some of those may have changed.

I formatted You Mixed-Up Siciliano for HTML. I also created a PG version of Temper.

This Month’s Productivity Killers

The search for work, as is to be expected, continues to cut productivity time. In addition, the blogs were down for a while. Hence I was unable to draft blog entries as far in advance as I like to. I have the time (and inclination to) now, though. Furthermore, my husband and I went to Cape Cod for our 20th wedding anniversary. So we spent time offline, plus there was only one computer between us (my laptop).

Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, Progress, 0 comments
25
May
2012

Portrait of a Character – Deborah Haddon

Portrait of a Character – Deborah Haddon

Deborah Haddon was first something of a Star Trek: Enterprise fanfiction red shirt character. But she grew on me, so she became more.

Origins

While writing Reversal, I needed a female Security crewman who could handle both erotic scenes and provide muscle. Hence Deb was born.

Portrayal

Barking up the Muse Tree | Jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Katee Sackoff as Deborah Haddon (image is for educational purposes only)

Katee Sackoff as Deborah Haddon (image is for educational purposes only)

Deborah is tough and tough-minded, but has a softer side. So Katee Sackhoff was a logical choice. I particularly like her no-nonsense look, plus of course she has serious sci-fi cred, having been in Battlestar Galactica.

She also needed to be someone who could clean up well and, at times, appear very vulnerable and feminine.

The look is, to me, believable.

Personality

Barking up the Muse Tree | Jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Katee Sackoff as Deborah Haddon (image is for educational purposes only)

Katee Sackoff as Deborah Haddon (image is for educational purposes only) This beautiful manip is by unusualsuspex – http://stpma.net/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=844 him.

Deborah spends much of her time standing guard, so her mind wanders. In our universe, this means her thoughts direct, more and more often to Captain Archer, on whom she develops a raging crush, described in both Together and in the alternate timeline story, The Black Widow.

This brings out some of her vulnerability and longing. As a person who mainly stands in the back and watches the rest of the crew working, she longs to be a part of things.

Romance

Barking up the Muse Tree | Jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Katee Sackoff as Deborah Haddon (image is for educational purposes only)

Katee Sackoff as Deborah Haddon (image is for educational purposes only)

Once her wrong-headed pairing in Together ends, Deb is approached by someone she might not have expected to show an interest, Chip Masterson. This relationship continues through to Fortune. I reveal it has resulted in a marriage and a child, Kenneth. Her descendants eventually include Richard and Eleanor Daniels and their mother, Chloe Masterson Daniels.

She ends up with Chip during the E2 stories as well.

Mirror Universe

Deb dies like a redshirt in the mirror universe, succumbing during Reversal, after a  short fling with Aidan MacKenzie.

Quote

“Security. I’m wily like a cat.”

Upshot

Smart and tough, Deborah Haddon can defeat most opponents with guile or strength or both. Call her Debbie at your peril.

Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, In Between Days series, Interphases series, Portrait, 14 comments
22
May
2012

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

Two universes, two radiation bands. If you need to know who belongs where, you’d better do some testing.

Origins

In Reversal, and then in Temper, the concept of two universes and crosses between them, comes to the fore. There has to be some means of checking a person’s universe of origin.

Radiation Bands

The concept comes from two TNG episodes. In Galaxy’s Child, a spaceborn life form known as “Junior” is threatening the Enterprise and is absorbing its energy.

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

In order to “sour the milk”, the energy signatures are changed to a different background radiation band. It is revealed that the band for our prime universe is twenty-one centimeters. This comes from a very real concept known as the Hydrogen Line.

In Parallels, Worf steps through several quantum realities (e. g. several universes), but eventually a quantum signature is matched and he can be returned to his correct universe. I have taken the ideas and combined them.

Here, There and Everywhere

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

If we are a twenty-one centimeter background radiation band universe, then surely there must be a twenty, a twenty-two, and so on. For my fanfiction, the twenty centimeter band universe is the mirror. The twenty-two, as is revealed by Eleanor Daniels in Where the Wind Comes Sweepin’ Down the Plain, is a place where, on Earth, the dinosaurs never died out. Hence a mirror-type situation could not develop there.

Heritage

Radiation bands are inherited, and a cross-bred child will split the difference.

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

Hence the children of Doug and Lili and Doug and Melissa have a twenty and one-half centimeter band, reflecting his twenty and the women’s twenty-one centimeter bands. Per Eleanor, until crossovers became more common, a radiation band of anything below twenty-one was a sure sign that someone was one of Doug’s descendants.

Calafans, who can easily shuttle back and forth, and who have origins that are readily determined by the color of their skin (silver for here, copper for the mirror), are not tested, as there is no need.

Testers

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

Tabletop wand scanner

Testing is accomplished in a few ways. During Temper, on the mirror side of things, the testers are table-top devices with wands. Eleanor is in possession of one (she is a docent at the Temporal Museum, with a specialty in the Terran Empire) and she demonstrates its use during Where the Wind Comes Sweeping Down the Plain. The image shown is actually a bar code scanner. Imagine it plugged into some sort of a tabletop device, possibly something appearing to be a lot like a personal computer or the like.

Spotlight on Original Technology – Radiation Band Testers

Pendant scanner

For our side of the pond, the scanner is a pendant worn around the neck, but devoid of any charm or decoration. The pendant is worn and then placed against a person, much like the mirror universe’s wand, so that a determination can be made as to which universe is the origination point for a particular person. The image at right is actually a UV tester. Imagine it attached to a longer cord and worn around the neck, although with the shorter cord it could conceivably be worn around the wrist.

Upshot

While the eventual future of these testers is as a curio, their history is far from pleasant for, during the war between the universes in Temper, anyone with the wrong band, on either side of the pond, is often shot on sight, with no questions asked. This shameful heritage is meant to drive home more of the horror of the Mirror Universe.

Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, Hall of Mirrors, In Between Days series, Spotlight, Times of the HG Wells series, 5 comments
18
May
2012

Portrait of a Character – Ethan Shapiro

Portrait of a Character – Ethan Shapiro

Ethan Shapiro grew out of, in part, a desire to show Jewish crew members on the NX-01. But along the way, he became a lot more. I really like this Star Trek: Enterprise fanfiction character.

Origins

For The Light, I wanted a character who was facing a circumstance where he would need a minyan. That is, a quorum of Jews for the express purpose of prayers. Having to say Kaddish, due to a death in the family, was the ideal scenario. Ethan was created to be the bereaved crew member.

Portrayal

Portrait of a Character – Ethan Shapiro

Jesse Eisenberg as Ethan Shapiro (image is for educational purposes)

As is true with a lot of the more ethnically obvious characters, I wanted an actor who would also be a member of that ethnic group. Therefore, I chose Jesse Eisenberg. Ethan isn’t meant to be the greatest-looking guy ever. He isn’t meant to be nebbishy either. This is not Woody Allen on the NX-01. Rather, the idea was to have someone who is not only convincingly Jewish but also is someone who, to be loved, maybe the girl needs to go beyond looks and see what’s really inside.

Personality

A little self-effacing, but extremely loyal to his friends, Ethan even defers to Andy Miller when, during The Light, Andrew comments that he’s going to ask out the only Jewish woman on the ship, Karin Bernstein. However, in Waiting, it’s revealed that Ethan is kicking himself for having done that, for he wants Karin.

In the E2 stories I am writing as of the posting of this blog entry, Ethan is even more lovesick and upset.

Mirror Universe

Ethan doesn’t, truly, have a mirror universe counterpart. In Fortune, it’s revealed that his parents’ counterparts delayed relations for a night, and, instead, Erin Shapiro was conceived. However, there is an earlier Ethan, an older relative, who is likely the person who Erin was named for. Doug reveals to Lili, in Reversal, that that is the name of the second man he’s killed. Furthermore, it is our universe’s Ethan who brings forth this confession from Doug.

Relationships

Ethan’s relationship with Karin drives some of his behind the scenes activities in Reversal and then in Fortune. In the E2 stories, things go differently for Ethan, and he attempts suicide when he cannot have Karin. When he recovers, in the first kick back, he weds an Ikaaran woman named Bithara; in the second kick back, his Ikaaran bride is named Timinka.

Quote

“My Great-Aunt Rachel saw a lot in her long life. She went from an Earth where people could barely get it together to seeing us go out here into the unknown. She used to tell me it was a little like wandering in the desert for forty years. You know, you’re not sure where you’re going, but you trust that wherever you get is going to be good. And I think it’s been good. And I’m glad she got a chance to see that. She was like a link to the past. And now it’s time to, to say good-bye and look to the new.”

Upshot

As Azar Hamidi says in Waiting, things might have to run their course. But then you might just see that Ethan, he just might be the one.

Posted by jespah in Fan fiction, In Between Days series, Interphases series, Portrait, 16 comments