The Confabulator Cafe

Tag: ephemera

  • Is there anyone you’d personally like to take revenge on?

    This week’s Flash Fiction prompt was to write about revenge. Everyone’s definition of revenge is a little different, and some of us aren’t quite as vengeful as others. It’s one thing to write about revenge, it’s quite another to feel vengeful in daily life. For this week’s Ephemera, we asked the Confabulators if there was anyone they’d like to take revenge on, and if they could get away with it, would they do it.

    Ashley M. Poland

    Not really. I still harbor some bitterness toward people I knew in high school, but I think it has more to do with a lack of closure than anything else. I have no way of knowing how they turned out, and they have no way of knowing how I turned out. (Though I still sort of hate the guy who once told me, “A million people want to be published; what makes you any better than them?” Eff you very much, buddy. Stop popping up in my head whenever I drink.)

    Paul Swearingen

    I already wreak revenge on scammers, spammers, telemarketers, and those who continue to request that I play games on Facebook. Scammers get reported to the state attorney general. Spammers’ messages go to spam hell, and then the spammers get blocked for life on sites that I mod. Telemarketers cannot get through my call blocking machine. Occasionally they get reported to the FCC and the state attorney general, too. And … send me a Facebook game request, and that gets blocked, plus I beg for more requests so that I can block them, too, and maybe even the person sending them. (Get too political on my newsfeed, and I can make you disappear from it …) Yep – mess with an old retired guy like me who has time on his hands, and I’ll make you regret it … slowly …

    Jason Arnett

    I like the concept of revenge but I think it requires me to be something I’m not naturally: hateful. My tendency is to stabilize rather than upset. Also, I’m patient. If I’m somehow Done Wrong, I know the Universe will somehow balance everything out. I know it sounds naively philosophical, but it works for me. I don’t see myself going out of my way to inflict hurt on someone else. That takes an awful lot of energy.

    Sara Lundberg

    I have a particular form of vengeance specifically designed for writers. If you do something to piss me off, I will take revenge upon you in one of my stories. I will do horrible things to you and point out all of your most unflattering traits, all the while thinly veiling your identity. Don’t cross me, or it might end up published one day.

    Jack Campbell, Jr.

    I try not to hold grudges. I am a very calm person. Laid-back to a fault. That being said, I am very capable of revenge, and there are definitely people I would take revenge on, whether they are hypothetical or real, I will not say. If they do hypothetically exist, I don’t want them to know until the moment is right, and I don’t want damning evidence against me.

  • The Sincerest Form of Flattery

    What’s that they say about imitation? Well, apparently I’m incompetent when it comes to flattery, because as far as I can tell my writing looks absolutely nothing like my favorite authors’ efforts.

    If I was the snooty type, I’d claim that the lack of similarities was intentional due to my artistic integrity, unique voice, particular point-of-view, blah blah blah. And…I guess I am snooty, because that’s true. Trying to project another author’s voice and tone into my own work feels phony to me. This goes to my answer to our future ephemera post related to fan fiction. I understand why people like to write fanfic—it gives the author an instant jump-start to their writing, and lets them create new tales about characters and worlds that they’ve grown to love through the original stories. But in order for me to stay inspired and motivated during the writing process, I need to create my own characters and worlds. Similarly, I very much want to craft my own writing style and voice.

    Another component to my lack of emulation in my writing is that I don’t have the proper training to pull it off. My favorite SF stories are always centered around cosmology, physics, rockets, and math, but I am not a trained cosmologist, physicist, rocket scientist, or mathematician. I’m no high-falutin’ scientist at all. Can I (and do I) write about the same topics I like to read about? Sure. Will I ever manage to write about them with the depth and expertise of my favorite authors? Probably not.

    All that said, I do try to borrow certain key traits from my favorite books and authors and let them guide my own creative process. Most importantly, I appreciate how my favorite writers don’t let their writing get in the way of the story. This approach really lends itself to my own natural style, so I’m constantly striving to write stories where the words disappear for the reader, and only the story is left. If I can manage that, I’d be a happy camper.