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 |  A hub for the "Book of Masks" universe. |
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The Interactives "The Book of Masks"  : A high school student discovers a grimoire that can make magical disguises."The Wandering Stars" : Sequel to "The Book of Masks.""Student Bodies" : A high school student is turned into a blue goo that can possess people.For non-WdC Members "The Book of Masks: Archives" : Dodges the "Servers Busy" barrier!"The Book of Masks (Abridged)" : Introductory storylines for new readers.Community "BoM/TWS Message Forum" : Community for readers of the interactives."BoM/TWS/SB Wiki" : Notes and documentation for authors. Spoilers!Current Polls None The Latest 6/26: Interactive: "A Rescue and Retreat" 6/26: Public: "A Rescue and Retreat"
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| Wow! Yesterday's Blind Poll wound up in a squeaker. "Talk to Caleb about Friday night" established a big early lead, but overnight the choice to "Forget it" caught up, and for awhile they were tied. But "Talk to Caleb" ended one vote ahead, so that's the choice that sets up the choices in today's Blind Poll. There's also a new "Plot Plinko" poll, where "Keep investigating the book" won by a landslide. [Polls completed and deleted.] |
| It's been a long time since we've had a poll. Let's have two of them! [Polls completed and deleted.] I am working on a storyline, and I have a number of chapters already lined up to publish, but I figure there's no harm in having a "Plot Plinko" storyline in my back pocket. I make no guarantees that I will write a storyline for the ultimate "Plot Plinko" choice, but let's see where the voting goes. This is also a poll where you can vote using GPs. See the bottom of the poll for details. The "Blind Poll" goes with the branch I'm currently writing. I will be writing ahead and making my own choices, and if you choose the same route I did, all well and good. If you pick different, then I will break off to continue the choice you guys made, and try to continue that branch instead. The result (I hope) will be a way of keeping me productive even without a solid plan for a storyline. |
| Today's chapter— Interactive: "A Motel Room and the Girl of Your Dreams" Public: "A Motel Room and the Girl of Your Dreams" —rounds off a short commission. Now on to another one: In "Pulp Friction" Will is in a lot of trouble. He and Caleb were screwing around with masks—pretending to be each other—when Will lipped off to Chelsea Cooper, who retaliated by sending her brutish boyfriend to beat the snot out of Will. So, one thing happened and then another and then another, and now ...Well, Gordon is now trapped in Will's body. Dane Matthias is trapped in Gordon's. And Will is stuck in Dane's. And that's bad news because Dane was acting as a drug courier for his lowlife criminal, delivering weed to the school's primary dealer, Gary Chen. Will failed to make the delivery, and now Chen has the underworld's permission to do anything to Dane (that is, to Will) short of killing him. Oh, and Will has agreed to put on a mask of Caleb and go on a date as him with Eva Garner. What happens next? Well, there's already one sequel written. But tomorrow you'll get an alternate ... |
| Technically, I'm giving you two chapters today: Interactive: "Five Cheers for the Cheerleaders!" + "A Cindy in Your Eye" Public: "Five Cheers for the Cheerleaders!" + "A Cindy in Your Eye" But that's because the first one is just another choice-extension chapter. |
| Today's chapter— Interactive: "Of Stephanie and Sabotage" Public: "Of Stephanie and Sabotage" —wraps up the last branch. It was written as a commission by someone who wanted to see some more of Katy getting into Stephanie's mask. Given that there was too much drama the last time Katy was inside that mask—Hannah got turned into a golem—I stepped back and branched off earlier to get something similar but without the golem complication. Tomorrow I start another commission, this one rather shorter—a five-chapter run starting at "Group Activities" and continuing through "Good Sports" and "The Jockettes" . It's another Will-and-Sydney story, taking off of the giant junction where they have decided to make their own "Brotherhood of Baphomet" and are deciding where to start and who to convert. This time it's going to be a sports team—one of the girls' teams—but which one, and who will be the first victim? Check in tomorrow to find out. |
| I was supposed to finish up the branch I've been working on with another chapter. But after looking at it I decided it was boring and that it needed a total rewrite. So I'm wrapping up that last branch prematurely. Starting today is an 8-chapter run returning to "It's a Boyfriend-Girlfriend Thing" . This is a branch where Will has gotten very friendly with Katy Conlee, one of the basketball players, and has shown her the masks. Katy used one on her friend Stephanie Wyatt, and then got into it. Maybe too much into it, because now she (Katy) is very keen to pursue Stephanie's vendetta against Hannah Westrick.I had written that branch to the point where Hannah had gotten petrified into a golem (because Will is that far enough along in the Personae) but I'm backing up a few chapters and taking an alternate route, one where he doesn't use Hannah as a victim in that spell. Things pick up here: Interactive: "Hacking Hannah Westrick" Public: "Hacking Hannah Westrick" |
| During my hiatus, I did have some other creative projects going on. Not writing projects (or else I would have continued with BoM) but other sorts that could be interrupted and picked back up easily with little loss of concentration. I've still got one of those going, and I was working on it yesterday morning, and the time got away from me so that I forgot all about updating BoM until very much later. Anyway, that's just to say that there was a hiccup, not an interruption, and the chapter I meant to put up is now up: Interactive: "Twenty Questions (At Least)" Public: "Twenty Questions (At Least)" |
| Yeah, I'm later than usual getting today's chapter up. I had a bunch of sudden errand to run. But today's chapter— Interactive: "Dee's Domicile" Public: "Dee's Domicile" —is now up. |
| Today's chapter— Interactive: "The Story with Sydney" Public: "The Story with Sydney" —shows Will acting with a little more pluck. Instead of letting Dee scare him off, he sticks around to see what's going to happen. This will be the start of a 7-chapter run. |
| So with today's chapter— Interactive: "Done and Doner" Public: "Done and Doner" —we conclude a very short, two-chapter storyline. Well, that was just to round off one choice the only way it could be rounded off. Tomorrow I'll back up and send Will down a closely related but alternate branch, where more is going to happen. |
| While looking through my files, I found a storyline that I was writing before the hiatus, but hadn't got around to publishing. As I get arranged and acclimated again, I will be publishing it. That way I'm less likely to wander off again after touching base. Interactive: "Yielding the Floor, Before You're Mopped With It" Public: "Yielding the Floor, Before You're Mopped With It" The background: Will has been experimenting with the grimoire, and he has met a new girl at school, Sydney McGlynn, who is also into the occult. They went exploring the town on a date, looking for ley lines, when they ran into a peculiar (and rather threatening) stranger. Sydney has let it slip to this stranger (who calls himself "Dee" and claims to be from another dimension) that she wants to hurt someone in her life. In the last chapter Will ran into this guy again, and has to decide if he too is going to help Sydney with what sounds like a murder plot ... |
| This could probably go up as an edit to the previous post, but I'll put it up as a separate one so that it gets seen: I don't think I had an extant commissions when I made that abrupt exit 2 months ago, but if you have or had commission ideas for me, please send them to me again. (And if you have new commission ideas, send those too.) I can't promise to take any commissions, but I will feel less lost and adrift if people remind me of old ideas or give me new ones. |
| Well, that was unexpected. So, first of all, I guess I should start by saying that I did not intend to disengage from this place for as long or as deeply as I did. I even stopped logging in, which was something that just kind of happened. I know that left some people hanging, and I do apologize for that. I am going to be catching up over the next few days, but it may take some time. As for what happened— Suffice it to say that a family member suffered a serious accident. Recovery from that is almost complete, but during that time my free time became fragmented and subject to interruption, and it became easiest to occupy myself with reading. There were in fact several weeks when I didn't even go on the internet. That's when I lost the habit of even checking in here. I am still not certain how much of a return I am going to be making. As I say, the family member with the accident is mostly recovered. But it will take time for me to look around and figure out what I need to be paying attention to and what I need to do. It will probably take even longer before I get positioned begin writing again. There has been a very serious interruption to my creative habits, more than just the usual "need to recharge" hiatus. |
| For personal reason I don't feel like getting into, I'm going to have to take a break from publishing. I don't think it will be for very long. But there are various things going on which have had the combined effect of destroying my writing hours, which has left me unable to concentrate enough to write new chapters. I've been working my way through my backlog over the last week, but I've now run out of chapters and so have nothing more to post. The stuff going on isn't life-threatening or -changing. As I say, it's just deranged my working hours. I might be able to continue writing in snatches here and there, but I just can't make any promises. I will continue to be around here -- there nothing to interfere with popping in and out online -- so I won't be gone. To people who have written in with commission ideas: I'm not ignoring you. To some of the pitches I am giving serious thought. It's getting stuff down that is the challenge. |
| As I said yesterday, today's chapter— Interactive: "Before the Rehearsal" Public: "Before the Rehearsal" —is supposed to open up an avenue to Hollywood. Masktrix already went there in the nearby "Beverly Hills Cult" , and that's great. But I had already introduced Paul Griffin in "Five Final Chances" , so I thought I'd bring him back here as another route to the same place. |
| Today's chapter— Interactive: "Who's Who at Westside High" Entry: "Who's Who at Westside High" —wraps up the commission I was working on, which I had a lot of fun imagining and writing. Next up, a continuation of "Group Activities" , which is one of those branching points where Will and Sydney have decided to form a Brotherhood of Baphomet and are choosing identities to steal and enslave in order to set it up. This one continues through a few chapters written by Masktrix—"Thinking Big" + "Masks Need Moms" + "Calling an Audible" —which I've now added to the Archives so that non-WdC members can easily access them. Tomorrow I will post the first of five chapters in my continuation. To foreshadow, this is the short branch I referred to in the forum post "BoM and Real-World References" Masktrix already sent Will and Sydney out to Hollywood, but there is another path that they could take, and I wrote this little line in order to set it up. |
| Next chapter in my current branch is up: Interactive: "Another Night of Holding Someone's Hand" Public: "Another Night of Holding Someone's Hand" The last poll is now closed, but the follow-up is now posted: [Poll completed and deleted] |
| My current branch is being written for a commission, and the commission itself starts in earnest today after a few chapters of set up. And it's a followup to a situation that was itself a commission. ... And it's interesting because I think (though I'd have to dig through my files to confirm) that this second commission is from a different person than who commissioned the first. So I don't think the person who asked for this plot twist even knows what is going on. Which makes me wonder: "Commentary: Clover Mystery" |
| In addition to today's chapters—links above—I have a new poll up: [Poll completed and deleted.] As the poll says: ""Focus Pocus" : Will has been experimenting with the magical grimoire he got at the used bookstore, and he has met a girl, Sydney McGlynn, with a similar interest in the occult. Will isn't sure, but he thinks there might be a budding romance between him and her. Before he can act on it, though, he and Sydney while tracing a ley line have run into a mysterious character who claims to be a refugee from Lemuria. This character—he calls himself "Dee"—offers to partner with them, lending them help with what they need in return for helping him with what he needs."Sydney seems ambivalent. What is Will's choice?" Yeah, that's an area I want to explore, but I'll let you guys pick how it gets explored. In addition to the free poll above, you can also vote with GPs by using the tip form at the bottom of the chapter you want to vote to get a sequel. Voting closes at noon on Friday. |
| I have thoughts on the world of BoM and what happens when a character like Will Prescott takes an identity-theft machine to a real-world location like Hollywood. I could post those thoughts here, but I post them instead in the forum, to encourage discussion: "BoM and Real-World References" |
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