Thursday, January 28, 2010

Comfort Zone


My new WIP is a middle grade book set on another planet. Yes you heard me right, another planet. I’m learning how to build worlds. It’s interesting because there are no rules, I can do whatever I want on this planet. I want to make it unique and I decided to have it a little different from earth. It will have two suns and be more desert like. The best part, the people are purple. Yeah I said purple.

When I first saw the trailer for Avatar I almost fell out of my chair. The people were blue. I couldn’t believe it. I called my daughter up because she’s helping me write the story and I said I just saw some blue people. I thought it was a sign from God that my purple people would be OK.

This is a different experience for me because I'm writing in a different genre, different age market, with characters that aren’t human, and I love it.

Sometimes you have to get out your comfort zone.

How have you stepped out of your comfort zone?
photo from iStockPhoto.com

2 comments:

Kayelle Allen said...

I'm an Avatar nut so I really liked your post. The Na'vi's wide, cat-like noses are exactly what I've always pictured for my feline humanoids, the Kin. I have four books set in a universe where they exist.

I write multi-cultural stories in more ways than one. My current book features an immortal who has just broken up with his mortal lover. In addition, the immortal (Luc) is black-skinned, and his lover was white-skinned. On the world Luc claims as his home, Kelthia, most of the people are dark-skinned like he is, yet he has an adopted son who is white. In the book, Luc falls in love with a feline-humanoid whose skin feels like velvet and is a burnished gold color.

Creating new worlds and languages, opening your eyes to new cultures and new ways of doing things is not an easy task. Kudos to you for taking it on. I'd enjoy meeting some purple people.

LaShaunda said...

Kayelle,

Thank you so much for stopping by. I'm loving your stories, they sound interesting.

This world building is wild. How do you come up with names? I still haven't named the planet, nothing is jumping out at me.

Wow I stopped by your web and you have a whole system to play with. I'm no way near that, but it has made me open my mind to imagine even more.

Thanks again for stopping by. I'll have to get one of your books.