Sucked into NaNoWriMo

Who can I blame for this…? I don’t even know how it started. Clicked a link (on twitter I think), followed it, and blam. Before I knew it I had signed up – and now that I’ve started, ideas/images/story-lines are streaming unbidden (and fairly incoherent at the moment) to get this “novel” done.

It got me thinking about the novels and stories I had read or watched. What I liked about them. Here’s a short but spoilery one-sentence-synopsis – so DO NOT READ THIS if you don’t wanna be spoiled – about:

George RR Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire Series, Star Wars, Ender’s Game(not the series), Hegemon (The series), Naruto, Avatar: The last Airbender.

 

What makes for an interesting antagonist… Lemme see

• Why would the antagonist want to keep pursuing the Main Character?
• Why do I find flat antagonists so unappealing? (See Voldemort in JK Rowlings Harry Potter Series, or even the Harkonnens in Dune, or Nazis in Indiana Jones)
• Star Wars (A New Hope): Darth Vader was after the droids because of their knowledge and the advantage it gives to the rebels. The story is eventually about redemption but it didn’t begin as such.
• Storm of Swords(not the series): Mance was fighting the night’s watch because he was running away from something (yet to be fleshed out) even more terrifying.
• Ender’s game: the various antagonists were jealous of ender’s success. The buggers tried to reach out to him before he annihilated them!
• Hegemon: The antagonist was some super genius rival of Bean.
• Saga of Pleiocene Exiles: Tanu, Firvulag, the exiles and Marc Remillard –  factions had difficult and conflicting goals.
• Naruto: Antagonist is a misguided friend out for revenge and needs enlightenment.
• Avatar: TLA: The Antagonist is a power-mad firebender – but the main challenge was Aang had to find a way to beat him without losing himself.

Ok. That’s enough for this rant. But the “novel” I come up with (within 3 weeks) needs to have the depth of the books I hold dear.