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A hub for the "Book of Masks" universe. |
The Interactives "The Book of Masks" ![]() "The Wandering Stars" ![]() "Student Bodies" ![]() For non-WdC Members "The Book of Masks: Archives" ![]() "The Book of Masks (Abridged)" ![]() Community "BoM/TWS Message Forum" ![]() "BoM/TWS/SB Wiki" ![]() Current Polls 6/18: "BoM Poll: "Vengeance on an Ex-Friend"" ![]() The Latest 6/19: Interactive: "Crushed by Another's Crush" ![]() 6/19: Public: "Crushed by Another's Crush" ![]() |
The vote in yesterday's poll ran close for most of the day and this morning too, so that I didn't feel comfortable writing a chapter before closing the poll. But when I saw "Hot" maintaining a tenuous lead through the final hours, I brainstormed the likely content of the sequel chapter far enough to come up with the likely choices at the end. So there's a new Plinko poll up: [Poll completed and deleted] Oh, and the chapter for today: Interactive: "When Charity Begins at Home" ![]() Public: "When Charity Begins at Home" ![]() |
There's really only so many titles you can give a blog entry when it's the same kind of content day after day. Interactive: "So It Turns Out You Can Be Too Careful" ![]() Public: "So It Turns Out You Can Be Too Careful" ![]() Poll: [Poll completed and deleted] If you can't guess where I am polling in the interactive, you can probably reasonably guess the kind of junction it is at. |
Okay, last-minute change of plans. I intended to publish one more chapter in the Will-and-Joey storyline, then switch to a new branch. But when I went to revise that chapter this morning, I wound up hacking it up so badly that I wanted to just start over. So I'm skipping it and switching to the next storyline now instead of tomorrow. So today's chapters launch the storyline that goes with the polls I've been running over the past two weeks—the storyline you guys have been crafting in the Blind Plinko polls. Now you get to see what you did! It begins with two chapters, a short one that sets up another choice, then a longer one that gets the story started properly: * Interactive: "And Then There Were Two" ![]() ![]() * Public: "And Then There Were Two" ![]() ![]() The background? Will has crafted a mask and has been searching the school for someone to test it on. Among the people he has spotted is a girl in the school's tutorial offices. She's the victim you chose in a poll that I ran a month and a half ago. And as for the poll I promised you today? Well, I'm tossing that out too. Instead, you get the first in a new round of Blind Plinko polls—[Poll completed and deleted]—for another storyline. And what's the background to this one? I'm not going to tell you. That way you will be completely in the dark, MadLibs style, about what's going on or who's involved. Although, as the story develops, the choices will probably give you enough clues to figure most of the background out. |
So, for whatever motive, you guys managed to really show me a thing or three! Well played! But one of the upshots is that I woke up this morning to find the poll in a tie. So even though "Put on the Rachel mask" ultimately won, I couldn't write a sequel chapter and have a new poll ready for you. So you're going to have to wait until tomorrow for the next poll. Meantime, here's the latest chapter: * Interactive: "The Sudden Crush of Events" ![]() * Public: "The Sudden Crush of Events" ![]() |
I don't even know why I'm posting a poll. I know what you guys are going to vote for! [Poll completed and deleted.] I'd only be surprised if it didn't wind up a 100% - 0% decision. [*] [*Edit: And seven minutes after I post this, some smartass decides to vote for the option that isn't going to get any votes!] * Interactive: "Schooled" ![]() * Public: "Schooled" ![]() |
Yesterday's poll went lopsided in one direction. So of course you get a poll today: [Poll completed and deleted.] I feel like the storyline up to now has been predictable, both in terms of its genre contours—most BoM storylines have a similar shape and progression when they start out—and because of the implications of the choices. I suspect some of you could write the storyline yourselves, using just the chapter choices as a prompt! But with today's chapter I think the storyline is finally becoming its own thing, and the implications of the choices (even the very bland and business-like first choice) are becoming inscrutable. Meanwhile, here's today's BoM chapter. There will be three more after this, and then it will pause. * Interactive: "A Mix-Up at the McDonalds" ![]() * Public: "A Mix-Up at the McDonalds" ![]() |
Yesterday's poll choices ran neck-and-neck most of the day, before "Partner with the guy" took a decisive lead overnight. So here's the follow-up poll: [Poll completed and deleted] Today's chapter: * Interactive: "Do You Mind?" ![]() * Public: "Do You Mind?" ![]() |
Yesterday's poll was very tight, but by this morning "Do something about this disaster" had opened up a big enough lead that I could write the sequel. So here's the new poll: [Poll completed and deleted] Here is today's chapter, too: Interactive: "Real People" ![]() Public: "Real People" ![]() |
The current storyline continues with Interactive: "The Shopping Spree" ![]() Public: "The Shopping Spree" ![]() And the polling continues with [Poll completed and deleted] |
Road trip successfully executed. Afterward, I was able to write a chapter for the Blind Plinko Challenge, so I've got a poll for you: [Poll completed and deleted] I can't help feeling that the storyline is pretty obvious (except for the names, of course) based on the poll prompts. But I'm hopeful that the next chapter will be more twisty, whichever choice gets voted on. Meanwhile, here's the chapter where the Joey Tartaglione storyline resumes: Interactive: "When Carly Met Joey" ![]() Public: "When Carly Met Joey" ![]() |
I haven't got a poll for you today, even though "Try to get the box back" ran away with yesterday's results. I do have a new chapter, though: Interactive: "The Girls at the Dairy Queen" ![]() Public: "The Girls at the Dairy Queen" ![]() It concludes that storyline. Tomorrow I'll pick up the storyline where Will was working with Joey Tartaglione, a homeschooled girl with even worse social skills than Will's. It will pick up off of "The Cheerleader Proxy" ![]() |
I mentioned below that I've been helping out an elderly neighbor. Tomorrow I have to take him on a road trip -- a short one, but it will consume most of the day. That means that tomorrow's BoM chapter will either go up very early or very late. It also means there probably won't be a poll because I probably won't have time to write a new chapter, even if today's poll results are lopsided. Speaking of which, the choice "Get your dad to force him to give it back" in yesterday's poll was far enough ahead when I woke up that I gambled that it would win (which it did), and wrote a sequel chapter for that choice. So here's today's poll: [Poll completed and deleted.] And here is today's chapter: * Interactive: "The Counterfeit Asshole" ![]() * Public: "The Counterfeit Asshole" ![]() |
The last Blind Plinko Poll almost ended in a tie at very end. But the choice "Ask your mom what happened to the stuff" was ahead when I woke up this morning, so I took a chance and worked on the sequel to that. It did win at the end, so you get another poll today: "Invalid Item" ![]() |
This Mad Libs poll thing isn't going to be as fun as it could be if the hidden story is obvious, and the story implied by yesterday's choices was probably pretty easy to guess. So I'm setting myself a challenge: Try twisting the story so that the events are not so easy to guess based on the choices in the poll. The choices in today's poll hint pretty broadly at what's happened, but I don't think they're as obvious as yesterday's poll choices, and I think I've made a start at setting up some corkscrew twists. We'll see what you make of it, and we'll what you vote for me to make of it. Last note: Yesterday's poll results skewed early and strongly toward "Seal the mask", so I got a head-start on writing the sequel chapter, and that's why I have a poll for you today. I expect that on some days I won't be able to anticipate the poll results so early, so there will likely be times when the poll shows up every other day instead. Anyway, today's poll: [Poll completed and deleted] Also, today's chapters, climaxing in choices which (Hmm!) parallel those in yesterday's poll. Well, this kind of thing typically happens early in a BoM storyline. Interactive: "Jamming with Javits" ![]() Public: "Jamming with Javits" ![]() |
Well, this is something I guess I get to brag about. While I was gone last month, "Book of Masks" took a prize in a site-wide awards competition. It's called "The Quills" ![]() I don't know how it works—in particular, how the nominations or voting goes—but "Book of Masks" was nominated in two categories this year: Best Fantasy or Science Fiction, and Best Campfire, In & Out, or Interactive. I'm immensely flattered just to have been nominated. But I was absolutely floored to return and find that it actually took the prize in the Interactive category. It has been nominated before in that category, a couple of years ago. But I sure as heck never thought it would ever win. So, I want to give my thanks to whoever it was that nominated "Book of Masks," and to those who voted to give it the award. I'll dedicate this win to the readers, who have supported and encouraged its madness. A full list of nominees, and a transcript of the ceremony, is here: "Invalid Item" ![]() |
As I mentioned yesterday, I did some writing during my hiatus, though it's nothing I'm really excited about. There's no reason not to share it, though, and good reasons why I should. It should help me get back into the saddle. So here's one of the storylines I tried working on. It was to be for a commission, but the commissioner had to cancel on account of troubles. This is the five-chapter set-up that I wrote, leading up to the commission itself. It starts with "Five Final Chances" ![]() ![]() * * * As for the Plot Plinko contest I ran the last time I was around here. I am trying to work on that, but the line you guys chose is one of those big, wide-open spaces where almost anything could develop, which makes it hard to focus on. So that's been slow to develop. The situation is similar to the set-up above: Will has made a mask, and he's hung back after school to find someone to test it on. You guys voted that he should try it on a random girl who he spotted inside the tutorial offices. Since I'm having trouble finding a direction, I'm going to try something a little different. I could write a chapter, post it, and ask you guys to pick a path to pursue—that would be a way of forcing myself to write, while also giving you a voice in how it develops. But I think it might be more interesting if we did it Mad Libs style, though. So instead of posting the chapters, I'm going to post the choices, devoid of context, and ask you to vote for them. First poll is up now. It's a boring choice—a familiar situation and you can easily guess the events that lead up to it—but it's one that has to be got through before things can get interesting: [Poll completed and deleted.] |
Oh, what a month that was. So here I am making a blog post again. Am I back? I don't know. I suppose I should start by trying to explain the last month or so. First of all, I think I was much less ready to return, at the start of May, than I thought I was. I have not had the energy to write, and have felt myself far too easily distracted. I have also been frustrated by BoM. I couldn't find anything good to write. Even when I found a storyline that I liked, the actual writing went sour on me. I would spend days working up the enthusiasm to write a chapter, and after writing it I would feel bored and impatient with it. There has also been some real-life distraction. I help out an elderly neighbor by walking his dog, and near the start of May my neighbor fell and broke a bone in his face, so I put in some extra time helping him on account of that. He has also reached the point where he shouldn't be driving -- at least not as far or as often as he has in the past -- so I have been driving him on errands. These errands don't take a lot of time. But I am a creature of habit, and have trained myself to write between certain hours of the day; other recreation (reading, watching movies, playing games) take up other hours. It was my writing hours that have been most interrupted by the (much more important) task of helping my neighbor, so that's been another disruption, one I've not adapted to yet. So. Low energy ... lack of enthusiasm ... distractions. These are still in play, so I can't declare that I am back, but I am going to make a conscious effort to revive the WdC habit, at least to the extent of checking in. I do have a dozen or so BoM chapters that I have accumulated during the last six weeks, and I'll start posting them tomorrow, though I'm far from thrilled by them. To the extent that my readers have been patient and not merely apathetic, I thank you all for it. |
I'm surprised/impressed with you guys. I thought for sure you were going to steer things down the "Teacher" route, which is where we went the last time we had a Plot Plinko. But the vote went pretty decisively for "Grab the girl in the tutorial office." I guess I'll have to figure out who she is. |
Okay, I'm beginning to see a pattern. Today's Plinko Poll: [Poll completed and deleted.] |
It wasn't a landslide, but "Use the mask on a friend" won pretty handily. So here's the next poll: [Poll completed and deleted.] Poll closes Friday at noon EDT. |