Barking up the Muse Tree

Dec

2015

Review – Calendar Turning Event #3111

Calendar turning event? Yes – it is New Year’s Eve.

Background

As the real calendar turned from 2013 to 2014, I hit upon the idea of having the Temporal Integrity Commission celebrate a bit. This celebration, because it’s the TIC, would have a bit of a twist and adventure to it.

Review – Calendar Turning Event #3111

Plot

Otra D’Angelo is throwing a new year’s party, and everyone in the TIC is invited, not just the Human Unit. Admiral Carmen Calavicci has her charges together, but Levi Cavendish has not thought ahead far enough to bring her a gift. So Carmen is well aware that he has adult ADHD and is squirrelly and has human relationship problems even on his best days. But she still feels that’s rude. When the gifts go missing during a transport, and then Carmen and Levi do as well, they have to work together in order to get back.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated K.

Upshot

I like this little look into the Commission but also into how difficult Levi really can be, and how Carmen makes a lot of allowances for his brilliance. In addition, these two characters get to work together. They cooperate and solve a problem. This is a far cry from how I had originally envisioned Levi and Carmen in the Times of the HG Wells series, where he would mainly be a reason for her to get migraine headaches. Instead, they work to get out of their predicament, and do it with style. Carmen’s love of booze comes to the forefront, but so does Levi’s preoccupation with his PADD and inattention when it comes to nearly anything else.

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Dec

2015

Review – You Make Me Want to Scream

Scream? Oh yeah.

Background

For a prompt of the same name, I could not get a rather earthy idea out of my head. The trick was to make it all about unexpected people.

So many sexual-style stories are all about young people. Or they are pretty people. Or they are folks in new relationships. Hence the unexpected twist is that the people in the story are none of these things (although Keiko is lovely). Instead, these are people with a history and all of the regular domestic stuff we all have in our lives. They aren’t on the run or at war or in any sort of big adventure. Rather, this is the quiet adventure of their lives.

Miles and Keiko

Plot

So I told this short story in first person, entirely from the perspective of a woman. She frankly talks about sex with her husband and owns up to being rather loud. In addition, the narrator also admits to having a fondness for a certain slightly unconventional methodology. However, she doesn’t mention her man’s name or even the act at all.

I reveal the couple when he says her name aloud – and tells her that her scream during orgasm woke up their baby daughter.

Oops.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated T.

Upshot

I love this little silly story. Because why should the leading men and women get to have all the fun? And I particularly enjoy the fact that this story pulls in what happens after the curtain comes down. What comes after ‘happily ever after’? So much like in Doug and Lili‘s marriage, my main idea was to give the characters spice well into their forties and beyond.

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Dec

2015

Portrait of a Character – Sophie Creighton

Sophie Creighton is Sandra’s only friend.

Origins

Sandra Sloane needed a roommate, someone she could bounce things off. Because Sandra is a homophobic individual, it made a kind of ironic sense to make her roommate a person of color.

Portrayal

Portrait of a Character – Sophie Creighton

Jennifer Hudson as Sophie Creighton

Sophie is played by Academy Award-winning actress and singer Jennifer Hudson.

I like this smart, multi-talented performer. I don’t have Sophie sing, though (Meredith and Rex do).

Personality

Generous and big-hearted, Sophie takes care of Sandra and Dan’s daughter, Kimmy, when nobody else will. This becomes a source of friction with Brooks, who wants Sandra to take responsibility for the child.

Relationships

Brooks Haynem

During the first E² kick back in time, Sophie marries canon character Brooks Haynem. But when Brooks helps Chang and the others to perpetrate an attack on Patti Socorro, Sophie and Brooks divorce, which frees Brooks to hook up with Sandra Sloane.

Jobiram

After divorcing Brooks, Sophie ends up with one of the two Ikaaran men that the ship takes on board during the first E² kick back in time.

Gary Hodgkins

In the second kick back in time, Sophie and Gary get together and have a son, Leo.

Mirror Universe

There are no impediments to Sophie existing in the Mirror Universe.

Jennifer Hudson as Mirror Sophie

I write Mirror women as having few options, and generally being treated rather poorly. If Sophie really can sing (I haven’t decided yet), then maybe she does that. It sure beats the alternative.

With Hudson’s extraordinary pipes, Sophie could survive and even thrive in the Mirror, so long as Empress Hoshi wasn’t jealous of her popularity.

Quote

“He doesn’t even realize that my full name is just Sophie, and not Sophia. I don’t think he really gives a damn about either of us. He’s just spraying his shots, hoping to hit something, but without any aim.”

Upshot

This utility infielder type of character has served me well, but she hasn’t been seen outside of an interphases situation. Maybe that should change.

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Dec

2015

Review – Report Card

Report Card does not work well as a story at all. I take full responsibility for that. I should have taken a lot more time to write it and try to perfect it. Instead, it comes across as the rushed collection of half-jokes that it is. This was a poor idea on my part, and it really shows.

Background

I had enjoyed writing Freak School, the original adventures of Klingon-human hybrid teenager Rayna Montgomery. As a result, I was looking to write a sequel.

The Archer Academy at Oberon (which Rayna Montgomery calls the Freak School)

Plot

So as a sequel and a bit of a complement to Freak School, Rayna’s report card and her class reports are shown. In addition, her parents receive a general communication from the Archer Academy at Oberon which includes a month’s worth of menus. Since this is a boarding school, and it quite literally caters to aliens, the foods on offer are canon and fanfiction alien foods in a mix with human specialties.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated K.

Upshot

The idea was a decent one, albeit without much of a plot. I think execution could have been considerably better. Rayna is a fun character, but the observations of her are dry. Stories about her do considerably better if her Valley Girl-style voice can be heard distinctly, and that simply is not the case with Report Card. Rayna deserves a far better sequel than this one.

In addition, the story, such as it is, suffers from how long it took to get it to go live. If the time period had been shorter, the jokes would have made a lot more sense. Instead, it’s just plain confusing.

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Dec

2015

Recurrent Themes – Unintentional Time Travelers

Background

Time travel is such a great trope that I just had to cover it. The most fun was when time travelers didn’t really want to go, but something or other swept them along anyway.

Appearances

Barking up the Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Times of the HG Wells logo courtesy of TemplarSora | Unintentional Time Travelers

Unintentional time travelers are such a fun idea to explore that I’ve gone to this well several times.

Concord

Concord is all about unintentional and intentional time travel.

Robert Lenox

Lenox, the real time traveler, is testing out a new device when Reed is accidentally swept along, and Reed’s ancestor is also displaced, as is Lenox’s own ancestor.

Malcolm Reed

Right before the start of the Xindi War, Malcolm is accidentally transported to 1775 Concord, Massachusetts.

Crackerjack

In Crackerjack, inadvertent time travel occurs because the errant pulse shot from Empress Hoshi (and the Temper story) hits Wesley and Geordi’s shuttle.

Wesley Crusher

For Wesley, the trip to 1941 Washington, DC is a voyage that he would rather not have taken.

Geordi LaForge

For Geordi, the voyage to Washington, DC in 1941 is the occasion to meet Rosemary Parker, although he also feels the effects of the prejudice of the time.

Day of the Dead

The Traveler is to blame for Chuck McBride and Tripp Tucker traveling in time.

Chuck McBride

McBride the jokester is yanked out of Upper Bavaria, but it’s never made clear as to exactly where and when he ends up.

Tripp Tucker

Tucker’s personal temporal displacement gets him to the 1944 liberation of the Dachau concentration camp.

The Continuing Adventures of Porthos – The Future Cat

Another pesky anomaly sends Porthos forward in time, in The Continuing Adventures of Porthos.

Porthos

The NX-01‘s resident quadruped takes his temporal displacement in stride, and makes friends with Data’s cat, Spot, although Porthos does miss Archer.

E² Timeline

For both kicks back in time, the entire ship unwittingly travels in time.

The Entire NX-01

No one is left behind when the Enterprise is kicked back in time.

Theorizing

In Theorizing, whatever is leaping Sam Beckett around does it to Jonathan Archer, too.

Captain Jonathan Archer

Archer’s mission is to help Sam Beckett’s wife, Donna Elise, move on with her life.

Dr. Sam Beckett

Dr. Beckett’s mission is to convince the Xindi Humanoid, Degra, that the deaths of millions of humans like Lizzie Tucker should be on his conscience.

Upshot

I adore this trope so much that I am continually trying to figure out another way to shoehorn it into my fan fiction.

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Dec

2015

Portrait of a Character – Jeremiah Hayes

Jeremiah Hayes is complex.

Origins

Jay and Doug Hayes both needed a father.

Steven Culp himself had suggested that Major Hayes’s name was either Jay or Jeremiah. By using Jay for the Major, it made sense to use Jeremiah for his father.

Portrayal

Jeremiah Hayes is played by veteran actor Steven Culp. I love the idea of using the same actor for both fathers and sons, much like Scott Bakula did in Quantum Leap.

Personality

Steven Culp as Jeremiah Hayes (image is for educational purposes only)

Rigid and somewhat militaristic in his thinking, Jeremiah orders his child or children (depends on the universe; in the prime universe, he has a daughter, Laura. Laura doesn’t exist in the Mirror Universe).

He isn’t necessarily mean, but he is emotionally unavailable. Jay and Doug both seek their father’s approval. For Laura, there is nearly nothing known about her relationship with her father.

Relationships

Lena Beckett

Jeremiah’s only known relationship is with Lena. He is, without question, the king of the castle.

Mirror Universe

In the mirror, Jeremiah is tough and he tries hard to make Doug tough. This causes Jeremiah to send his only child away to boarding school a few months before Doug has to go. The idea is to toughen Doug up, but it frightens the sensitive child. When Doug is beat up enough times, he becomes tough and unfeeling on his own, and without Jeremiah’s help. It isn’t until Doug meets Lili that he learns to open up.

Is Jeremiah a spousal abuser? There have been readers who have interpreted him that way. My own personal jury is out. I think that in the Mirror Universe, he treats Lena fairly well. After all, I write MU women as having a tough lot in life. Lena is no exception. But it’s quite the coup for her to have become attached to such a strong man. But Jeremiah isn’t necessarily powerful, and they aren’t necessarily wealthy.

Quote

“No, he will be beaten up for it. Don’t you understand? They will tear him apart if they think they can get any sort of an advantage. Do you not get that?”

Upshot

Given how Jeremiah behaves, and what he says in the Mirror, his early life was a lot like Doug’s. Doug gets a chance to redeem himself, whereas Jeremiah never seems to. In the prime universe, he’s mainly just a rigid military man. But in the Mirror Universe, he’s another casualty.

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Dec

2015

Review – D’Storlin

D’Storlin is a story where people ask if it has a basis in true events. Except, it does not. Yet it certainly could be. The events are (in my opinion) realistic and downright frightening. Many people lash out exactly like this. And kids can’t always bounce back or have someone wipe their records. Some things are just plain permanent. Like the scarlet letter or the mark of Cain.

Background

So I recall discussions about Xindi Reptilians, and how we had never seen any younger ones in canon. At the same time, there were also discussions about how well Spock and other hybrids seemed to get along in canon Star Trek society. And all I could think of was – that’s unrealistic.

D’Storlin

Plot

For a hybrid child, teenaged life is even more fraught with embarrassment, mood swings, and bullying. I cannot conceive of that not being true, ever. This put-upon human-Xindi Reptilian hybrid, attends a primarily human school on Earth. Much like Rayna Montgomery, he has to try to get along with the human majority. However, in Rayna’s case, she acted out by sleeping around at a young age, and occasionally growling. But for the most part, Rayna’s actions are peaceful ones.

Not so with the title character, when this friendless, bullied child is pushed too far one day. And the results are not pretty. Plus, they are all too permanent for both him and one of his tormentors.

Story Postings

Rating

The story is rated K+.

Upshot

So when this story was originally posted on Ad Astra, readers asked me whether it was taken from real life. I consider that to be an exceptionally generous compliment. Because it was not.

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Dec

2015

Portrait of a Character – Marie Helêne Ducasse O’Day

Marie Helêne Ducasse O’Day was originally not to be seen.

Origins

In order to explain why Lili O’Day was so isolated in Reversal, I needed for her family to be gone. As a result, I randomly chose a house fire, at age nine, as being the cause of her orphaning. And therefore, Lili needed to have parents, even briefly.

Portrayal

Barking up the Muse Tree | jespah | Janet Gershen-Siegel | Young Lili O'Day with her mother, Marie Helêne Ducasse O'Day

Young Lili O’Day with her mother, Marie Helêne Ducasse O’Day (image is for educational and references purposes only)

I have no idea who this woman is. The image comes from Flickr, and I was really looking for a fair-skinned and fair-haired girl of the right age. The woman’s image was a bonus, as was the painting on the little girl’s face. I mean no disrespect in continuing to use this image.

If I were to cast Marie Helêne now, I would choose a middle-aged blonde actress, possibly someone like Mary Stuart Masterson. As a bonus, I ‘cast’ Ms. Masterson in a wholly original trilogy, The Obolonk Murders. I like this smart and lovely actress who feels natural-looking.

Personality

Smart and artistic, Marie Helêne is a potter in both universes. In the Mirror, that makes her something of an elite. In the prime universe, her artistic bent passes along to Lili and to two of her three grandchildren, who she never sees, Declan Reed and Marie Patrice Beckett.

Relationships

Peter Thomas O’Day

Marie Helêne’s only known relationship is with Pete. They have a good relationship in both universes.

Mirror Universe

In the Mirror, Peter and Marie Helêne have a difficult life, as Pete says something he’s not supposed to, and inadvertently is branded a dissident.

Mary Stuart Masterson by David Shankbone (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

However, in the Mirror Universe, Pete Marie Helênedeliberately set the fatal house fire. This is because they have no other options.

Quote

“They’ll never let you come back. And the kids and me, we’ll never recover. Charlotte will end up turning tricks this afternoon, or I will! And Declan will become a thief, if he’s lucky, and he lives that long.”

Upshot

Historical circumstances make it so that this character can’t appear much more than she already has. But any time I write Lili remembering her childhood, Marie Helêne isn’t far behind.

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Nov

2015

Progress Report – November 2015

November 2015 worked out for me for continuing works. Hence there was little new stuff.

Posted Works

It was a month for continuations, and not really for starting anything new. So on Wattpad, I continued posting Fortune. In addition, on Fanfiction.net, I continued to post A Long, Long Time Ago. Finally, on the G & T Show forums, I continued to post Reversal.

November 2015 Milestones

See the Stats page for individual read and review counts.

WIP Corner

Main work was done on wholly original fiction as Star Trek fanfiction took a backseat to NaNoWriMo. And I do not mind that one bit, as NaNoWriMo is very important to me. As a result of the push I got from NaNoWriMo, I wrote a book called The Enigman Cave.

Prep Work

The month began with the end of the 24 Hours of G & T and I got a chance to talk writing! It was great fun and will be on YouTube soon.

This Month’s Productivity Killers

NaNoWriMo!

Which technically isn’t a productivity killer at all; it’s more that I was productive, but it sure as heck wasn’t for fanfiction. Instead, I worked on an original science fiction book, The Enigman Cave. I ‘won’ NaNoWriMo on the 20th by making it to 50,000 words and then I continued as the story was only maybe one-half to two-thirds completed by then. This cushion will come in very handy at editing time.

Furthermore, I had schoolwork as I was looking to get as much accomplished as possible in preparation for the end of the year. I am already set to take some time off from my internship. It’s enough already. I am pretty burned out and God I want school to be done with already. Feh!

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Nov

2015

Portrait of a Character – Herbie Shapiro

Herbie Shapiro is a historical figure in my fan fiction.

Origins

I wrote Shapiro specifically for the Tripp Tucker end of life story, Day of the Dead.

Portrayal

Herbie is played by Jesse Eisenberg (although Herbie would be wearing glasses, this is how I see him).

Portrait of a Character – Herbie Shapiro

Jesse Eisenberg as Herbie Shapiro

It’s important to me that Herbie be played by a Jewish actor. Further, I think Eisenberg could convincingly be the voice of reason during a lot of the weirder changes that occur during Day of the Dead.

Personality

Intelligent and compassionate, when Herbie sees Milena Chelenska, her sister Noemy, and Mrs. Klinghofer while liberating Dachau, he immediately decides to try to help them. It’s possible that Herbie’s actions help Milena to survive long enough to meet Richard Daniels, thereby making him vital to the integrity of the timeline.

Relationships

Herbie says he has a girl, but she is never actually mentioned by name. But he marries someone (and not necessarily her), as he is an ancestor to Ethan – and, by definition, Rebecca.

Mirror Universe

Jesse Eisenberg as Mirror Herbie

There are no impediments to Herbie existing in the Mirror Universe. For the Mirror, prior to First Contact, life had to be even shorter, more brutal, and nastier. For Jews in the Mirror, as I write them, if Herbie was to practice his faith at all, he would have to do so in secret, much like the Mirror Universe version of Leah Benson. I doubt he would be called Herbie, either. He might even change his first name in order to fit in better (but not his last name, as he is an ancestor to the Mirror Ethan, who is one of Doug‘s kills). Perhaps he’d be Henry.

Quote

“No, that’s not true. I got a letter from my mother. She saw on the newsreel when Auschwitz was liberated, back in January. …

“Nothing much, Tony. But we had heard rumors, you know? I got a cousin who got out in ’37 and he said he heard they was burning bodies in these places. My mother just wrote that it was, it was confirmed, y’see. Arbeit macht frei. I bet that’s a big old Nazi laugh.”

Upshot

For a somewhat throwaway character, I feel Herbie packs a punch. He’s memorable, and not just for his place within the overall timeline.

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Review – Calendar Turning Event #3111

Background

Plot

Story Postings

Rating

Upshot

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Review – You Make Me Want to Scream

Background

Plot

Story Postings

Rating

Upshot

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Portrait of a Character – Sophie Creighton

Origins

Portrayal

Personality

Relationships

Brooks Haynem

Jobiram

Gary Hodgkins

Mirror Universe

Quote

Upshot

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Review – Report Card

Background

Plot

Story Postings

Rating

Upshot

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Recurrent Themes – Unintentional Time Travelers

Background

Appearances

Concord

Robert Lenox

Malcolm Reed

Crackerjack

Wesley Crusher

Geordi LaForge

Day of the Dead

Chuck McBride

Tripp Tucker

The Continuing Adventures of Porthos – The Future Cat

Porthos

E2 Timeline

The Entire NX-01

Theorizing

Captain Jonathan Archer

Dr. Sam Beckett

Upshot

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Portrait of a Character – Jeremiah Hayes

Origins

Portrayal

Personality

Relationships

Lena Beckett

Mirror Universe

Quote

Upshot

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Review – D’Storlin

Background

Plot

Story Postings

Rating

Upshot

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Portrait of a Character – Marie Helêne Ducasse O’Day

Origins

E² Timeline