Writing

483 readers

1 users here now

Discuss writing, post craft resources, ask for feedback, etc!

No misconduct, including: harassment, abuse, assault, bullying, illegal activity, or discrimination.

Follow all sh.itjust.works rules.

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

ElizabethEarle@sh.itjust.works

What's your current WIP about? (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago by Hanabie@sh.itjust.works to c/writing@sh.itjust.works

6 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I'm currently trying to outline a Space Opera novel. This will be my 5th book; my other 4 were learning experiences, so I'll likely start over with a new pen name.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] socialjusticewizard@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I haven't got a great elevator pitch for it yet but essentially there are a number of different ways to do magic, split by culture. I've passed it through a number of filters to keep it from being too much of an anvil, but several of the forms of magic are stands-in for the labour theory of value. Magicians can become very powerful by effectively stealing and monopolizing magic from a larger group of people, or they can be individually quite weak but collectively strong. The 'socialist' magicians have learned that they can compete a bit with the stronger magicians by collectively agreeing on someone to share their magic with, but it's hard to keep a power structure like that when all around them are people trying to steal all their magic.

This stuff is all a backdrop to a story that's a more standard adventure journey, but those themes do recurrently crop up and will eventually be core to some of the conflict

[–] Hanabie@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Gotcha. I had an image in mind of a fantasy society trying to replace their monarchy with a socialist system of governance, but your idea sounds interesting, too.

[–] socialjusticewizard@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 years ago

There's an element of that to it. The overarching villain represents a hostile monopolistic corpo in the analogy, and a continent-spanning emperor in the text, and "socialism" is going to be needed to defeat him.