Getting back in the saddle, I hope.

Got a bit of writing done this morning.  Here's the new(est) opening paragraph of Magus of Athlinar. 

The airship juddered, engines roaring in protest.  Sparks spat from the ship's skin, air roaring as loud as the straining engines. Tossed against the back of her seat, Meida craned her head to look out the window, anticipating either an attack or flaming gas bladders and impending crash.  The winding, sixty-foot levee was passing below, explaining the sudden turbulence:  They'd reached Athlinar's outer wards.  Cattle and goats glanced up from marshy fields and rice paddies, workers from tall ladders in the mango groves.  Apparently they weren't worried a fireball was about to explode over their heads despite the corona of sparks surrounding the airship.

She leaned back against the velvet upholstery, twitching her enveloping chadri out of her way as she dug into her belt pouch.  Figures the arrogant magi of Athlinar wouldn't care if they scared their passengers into heart failure by an unannounced and needlessly rough crossing through the perimeter of the city state's defenses.

The craft dropped again, shoved her stomach into her throat.  A glance showed the marshy fields changing into jungle and the rising spires of drowned Mumbai in the distance, gleaming ruddy in the sunset, clouds of mothras drifting among them, golden, tentacled bubbles.  The place was still deadly despite the mothras; retexophage constructs gobbled the ambient radiation, but nothing could slow radioactive half-life, not even Angelaeic biotech and magic that had spawned the tekmagick revolution.  A human still wouldn't survive a ten minute exposure in the vast towers, remnants of the Assonance Event and the nuclear firestorm of the resulting panic.

It's still rough as I just wrote it; but I'm trying to show a far-distant future in a world where tekmagick rules and our physical laws have combined with those of another universe.  Hopefully, this is working to show the story is science fantasy (tech and magic combined being the clue), a bit about where Meida is heading, and a bit about the attitude of the place where she is heading, Athlinar, hotbed of magi.  The second para is supposed to give a bit of historic background and establish the location somewhat, as well as hint that climate changes and worldwide devastation (including nuclear strikes) have occurred in the past.

Comments

[fairyhedgehog]

It works for me!

[Adam Heine]

You had me at airship.

Seriously, this is pretty awesome for a first draft. I'd read on.

[Charles Gramlich]

Sounds good. I love the word "juddering" and don't see it nearly enough. I'm absolutely serious!

[writtenwyrdd]

It's a great word, isn't it?

[writtenwyrdd]

Thanks!

[writtenwyrdd]

Thanks! I hope to get rolling on the thing and actually finish it.

[jjdebenedictis]

I had to read one sentence three times before I realized it said "gas bladders", not "gall bladders".

Apparently I need more of this caffeinated beverage I am drinking. Flaming gall bladders have no place on an airship in peril--everyone's got enough to worry about already.

Thus, in the absence of any sort of coherent thought of my own, I'll just ditto Adam Heine; this seems like a pretty awesome first draft, and I would also keep reading!

[writtenwyrdd]

You guys make me feel all smart and stuff. Thanks! Flaming gall bladders are something I can live without-- Oh, wait a sec, I am!

[writtenwyrdd]

the one thing about using airships that concerns me, Adam, is that this is specifically not steampunk. It's just that airships strike me as a reasonable, ecological means of air travel.

[Adam Heine]

I wouldn't worry about that. Steampunk often includes airships, true. But airships do not always equal steampunk. When you start mentioning magic and drowned Mumbai, I think it differentiates it enough.

[Bernita]

Yup, excellent--most people would be pleased to consider it a final.
"drowned Mumbai etc...That description is particularly fine.

[laughingwolf]

pretty cool, but 'mumbai'...?

what they renamed 'bombay' in rl, or is it your word here?

[writtenwyrdd]

They renamed it years ago, LW!

[laughingwolf]

yup, but all the older ones resent that change and will forever call it 'bombay'

[writtenwyrdd]

A friends wife is from Leningrad aka St. Petersburg I believe. They changed the name back some years ago, but she still calls it Leningrad, because that's what it was called her whole life and it's the right name to her!